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Copyright, 1909
By Ljttle, Brown & Company
Copyright, 1910
By p. F. Collier & Son
manufactured in u. 8. a.
447522
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• • • •
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Designed, Printed, and Bound at
die CdUer 9nM, gnem Dork
I
CONTENTS
PAGE
Title, Prologue and Epiloguss to the Recuyell of the
Histories of Troy William Caxton 5
Epilogue to Dictbs and Sayings of the Philosophsrs
WnxiAM Caxton 10
Pbologue to Golden Legend William Caxton 14
Prologue to Caton William Caxton 15
Epilogue to Aesop William Caxton 18
Proem to Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. .William Caxton 19
Prologue to Malory's King Arthur William Caxton 21
Prologlte to Virgil's Eneydos William Caxton 25
Dedication of the Institutes of the Christian Religion
John Calvin 29
translated by JOHN ALLEN
Dedication of the Revolutions of the Heavenly Bodies
NicQLAus Copernicus 55
Preface to the History of the Reformation in Scotland
John Knox 61
Prefatory Letter to Sir Walter Raleigh on The Faerie
QuEENE Edmund Spenser 64
Preface to the History of the World
Sir Walter Raleigh 69
Prooemium, Epistle Dedicatory, Preface, and Plan of the
Instauratio Magna, Etc FnANas Bacon 122
translation edited by J. SPEDDING
1
(1) HO— Vol. 88
\
2 CONTENTS
Preface to the Novum Organum FkANcis Bacon
Pretace to the First Fouo Edition of Shakespeare's
Plays Heminge and Condell
Preface to the Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathe-
M ATiCA Sir Isaac Newton
translated by ANDREW MOTTE
Preface to Fables, ANaENT and Modern.. . .John Dryden
Preface to Joseph Andrews Henry Fielding
Preface to the English Dictionary Samuel Johnson
Preface to Shakespeare Samuel Johnson
Introduction to the Propylaen J. W. von Goethe
Prefaces to Various Volumes of Poems
William Wordsworth
Appendix to Lyrical Ballads William Wordsworth
Essay Supplementary to Preface. .William Wordsworth
Preface to Cromwell Victor Hugo
Preface to Leaves of Grass Walt Whitman
Introduction to the History of English Literature
H. A. Taine
F
INTRODUCTORY NOTE
No part of a hook is jo intimate as the Preface, Here, after
the Ions labor of the work is over, the author descends from
his platform, and speaks with his reader as man to man, dis-
closing kis hopes and fears, seeking sympathy for his difficulties,
oifering defence or defiance, according to his temper, against
the eriticistns vihich he anticipates. It thus happens that a per-
sonality which has been veiled by a formal method throughout
many chapters, is suddenly seen face to face in the Preface; and
this alone, if there were no other reason, would justify a volume
of Prefaces.
But there are other reasons why a Preface may be presented
apart from its parent work, and may, indeed, be expected some-
times to survive it. The Prologues and Epilogues of Caxton
were chiefly prefixed to translations which have long been super-
seded; but the comments of this frank and enthusiastic pioneer
of the art of printing in England not only tell us of his personal
tastes, but are in a high degree illuminative of the literary habits
and standards of western Europe in the fifteenth century. Agaiit,
modern research has long ago put Raleigh's "History of the
World" out of date; but his eloquent Preface still gives us a
rare picture of the altitude of an intelligent EUsabethan, of the
generation which colonised America, toward the past, the pres-
ent, and the future worlds. Bacon's "Great Restoration" is no
longer a guide to scientific method; but his prefatory statements
as to his objects and hopes still offer a lofty inspiration.
And so with the documents here drawn from the folios of
Copernicus and Calvin, with the criticism of Dryden and Words-
worth and Hugo, vaith Dr. Johnson's Preface to his great Dic-
tionary, with the astounding manifesto of a new poetry from
Walt Whitman's "Leaves of Grass" — each of them has a value
and significance independent now of Ike work which it orig-
inaUy introduced, and each of them presents to us a man.
.PREFACES AND EPILOGUES
BY WILUAM CAXTON
RECUYELL OF THE HISTORIES OF TROY
Title and Prologue to Book I
FERE bcginneth the volume entitled and named the
Recuyell of the Histories of Troy, composed and
drawn out of divers books of Latin into French by
! right venerable person and worshipful man, Raoul le
feure, priest and chaplain unto the right noble, glorious,
1 mighty prince in his time, Philip, Duke of Burgundy,
E Brabant, etc., in the year of the Incarnation of our Lord
i a thousand four hundred sixty and four, and translated
i drawn out of French into Engrlish by William Caxton,
^uercer, of the city of London, at the commandment of the
right high, mighty, and virtuous Princess, his redoubted
Lady, Margaret, by the grace of God Duchess of Burgundy.
of Lotrylk, of Brabant, etc. ; which said translation and
work was begun in Bruges in the County of Flanders, the
first day of March, the year of the Incarnation of our said
Lord God a thousand four hundred sixty and eight, and
ended and finished in the holy city of Cologne the 19th
day of September, the year of our said Lord God a thousand
four hundred sixty and eleven, etc.
WUUm
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N
WnXIAM CAXTON
And on that other side of this leaf followeth the prologue. I
When I remember that every man is bounden by the 1
commandment and counsel of the wise man to eschew I
sloth and idleness, which is mother and nourisher of vices, I
and ought to put myself unto virtuous occupation and I
business, then I, having no great charge of occupation, I
following the said counsel took a French hook, and read I
therein many strange and marvellous histories, wherein I |
had great pleasure and delight, as well for the novelty of
the same as for the fair language of French, which was la
prose so well and compendiously set and written, which
methought I understood the sentence and substance of
every matter. And for so much as this book was new and
late made and drawn into French, and never had seen it
in our English tongue, I thought in myself it should be a.
good business to translate it into our English, to the end
that it might be had as well in the royaurae of England as
in other lands, and also for to pass therewith the time, and
thus concluded in myself to begin this said work. And
forthwith took pen and int, and began boldly to run forth
as blind Bayard in this present work, which is named
"The Eecuyell of the Trojan Histories," And afterward
when I remembered myself of my simpleness and unper-
fectness that 1 had in both languages, that is to wit in
French and in English, for in France was I never, and waa
bom and learned my English in Kent, in the Weald, where
I doubt not is spoken as broad and rude English as in any
place o£ England; and have continued by the space of 30
years for the most part in the countries of Brabant,
Flanders, Holland, and Zealand. And thus when all these
things came before me, after that I had made and written
five or six quires I fell in despair of this work, and pur-
posed no more to have continued therein, and those
quires laid apart, and in two years after laboured no more
in this work, and was fully in will to have left it, till on
a time it fortuned that the right high, excellent, and right I
virtuous princess, my right redoubted Lady, ray Lady
Margaret, by the grace of God sisler unto the King of
England and of France, my sovereign lord, Duchess of
Burgundy, of Lotryk, of Brabant, of Limburg, and of
HISTORIES OP TBOT
Luxembourg, Countess of Flanders, of Artois, and of Bur-
gundy, PalalJne of Hainauit, of Holland, of Zealand and
of Namur, Marquesse of the Holy Empire, Lady of
Frisia, of Salins' and of Mechlin, sent for me to speak
wth her good Grace of divers matters, among the
which I let her Highness have knowledge of the fore-
said beginning of this work, which anon commanded me
to show the said five or six quires to her said Grace;
and when she had seen them anon she fotmd a default
in my English, which she commanded me to amend,
and" moreover commanded me straitly to continue and
make an end of the residue then not translated; whose
dreadful commandment I durst in no wise disobey, be-
cause I am a servant unto her said Grace and receive of
her yearly fee and other many good and great benefits,
(and also hope many more to receive of her Highness),
but forthwith went and laboured in the said translation
after my simple and poor cunning, also nigh as I can follow-
ing my author, meekly beseeching the bounleous Highness
of my said Lady that of her benevolence list to accept and
take in gree this simple and rude work here following; and
if there be anything written or said to her pleasure, I shall
think my labour well employed, and whereas there is de-
fault that she arette it to the simpleness of my cunning
which is full small in this behalf; and require and pray all
them that shall read this said work to correct it, and to
hold me excused of the rude and simple translation.
And thus I end my prologue.
Epilogue to Book II
Thus endeth the second book of the Recule of the
Histories of Troy. Which bookes were late translated
into French out of Latin by the labour of the venerable
person Raoul le Feure, priest, as afore is said: and by me
indigne and unworthy, translated into this rude English
by the commandment of my said redoubted Lady, Duchess
of Burgundy, And for as much as I suppose the said two
books be not had before this time in our English language,
therefore I had tiie better will to accomplish this said
i
work; which work was begun in Bruges and continued in
Ghent and finished in Cologne, in the time of the troublous
world, and of the great divisions being and reigning, as well
in the royaumes of England and France as in all other
places universally through the world; that is to wit the year
of our Lord a thousand four hundred seventy one. And as
for the third book, which ireateth of the general and last
destruction of Troy, it needeth not to translate it into
English, for as much as that worshipful and religious man,
Dan John Lidgate, monk of Bury, did translate it but
late; after whose work I fear to take upon me, that am
not worthy to bear bis penner and ink-horn after him, to
meddle me in that work. But yet for as much as I am
bound to contemplate my said Lady's good grace, and also
that his work is in rhyme and as far as I know it is not had
in prose in our tongue, and also, peradventure, he trans-
lated after some other author tlian this is; and yet for as
much as divers men be of divers desires, some to read in
rhyme and metre and some in prose ; and also because that
I have now good leisure, being in Cologne, and have none
other thing to do at this time; in eschewing of idleness,
mother of all vices, I have delibered in myself for the
contemplation of ray said redoubted lady to take this labour
in hand, by the sufferance and help of Almighty God;
whom I meekly supplye to give me grace to accomplish it
to the pleasure of her that is causer thereof, and that
she receive it in gree of me, her faithful, true, and most
humble servant, etc.
Epilogue to Book III
Thus eod I this book, which I have translated after mine
Author as nigh as God hath given me cunning, to whom be
given the laud and praising. And for as much as in the
writing of the same my pen is worn, my hand weary and
not steadfast, mine eyne dimmed with overmuch looking on
the white paper, and my courage not so prone and ready
to labour as it hath been, and that age creepetli on me
^aily and feebleth a!l the body, and also because I have
promised to divers gentlemen and to my friends to address
HISTORIES OF TROY
to them as hastily as I might this said book, therefore I
have practised and learned at my great charge and dispense
to ordain this said book in print, after the manner and
form as ye may here see, and is not written with pen and
ink as other books be, to the end that every man may
have them at once. For ail the books of this story, named
"The Recule of the Histories of Troy" thus imprinted as ye
here see, were begun in one day and also finished in one
day, which book I have presented to my said redoubted
Lady, as afore is said. And she hath well accepted it,
and largely rewarded me, wherefore 1 beseech Almighty
God to reward her everlasting bliss after this life, praying
her said Grace and all them that shall read this book not
to disdain the simple and rude work, neither to reply against
thi; saying of the matters touched in this book, though it
accord not unto the translation of others which have written
it. For divers men have made divers books which in all
points accord not, as Dictes. Dares, and Homer. For Dictes
and Homer, as Greeks, say and write favorably for the
Giecks, and give to them more worship than to the Trojans;
and Dares writeth otherwise than they do. And also as for
the proper names, it is no wonder that they accord not, for
some one name in these days have divers equivocations
after the countries that they dwell in; but all accord in
conclusion the general destruction of that noble city of
Troy, and the death of so many noble princes, as kings,
dukes, earls, barons, knights, and common people, and the
ruin irreparable of that city that never since was re-edified;
■which may be example to all men during the world how
dreadful and jeopardous it is to begin a war and what
harms, losses, and death followeth. Therefore the Apostle
saith: "All that is written is written to our doctrine,"
which doctrine for the common weal I beseech God may
be taken in such place and time as shall be most needful in
increasing of peace, love, and charity; which grant us He
that suffered for the same to be crucified on the rood tree.
kOd say we ali Amen for chari^ I
WILLIAM CAXTON
DICTES AND SAYINGS OF THE PHILOSOPHERS
FissT EDITION (1477). Epilogue
Here endeth the book named The Dictes or Sayings
of the Philosophers, imprinted by me, William Caxton,
at Westminster, the year of our Lord 1477. Which book
is late translated out of French into English by the noble
and puissant Lord Lord Antony, Earl of Rivers, Lord of
Scales and of the Isle of Wight, defender and director of the
siege apostolic for our holy father the Pope in this royaume
of England, and governor of my Lord Prince of Wales.
And it is so that at such time as he had accomplished
this said work, it liked him to send it to me in certain quires
to oversee, which forthwith I saw, and found therein
many great, notable, and wise sayings of the philosophers,
according unto the books made in French which I had
often before read; but certainly I had seen none in English
until that time. And so afterward I came unto my said
Lord, and told him how I had read and seen his book,
and that he had done a meritorious deed in the labour
of the translation thereof into our English tongue, where-
in he had deserved a singular laud and thanks, &c. Then
my said Lord desired me to oversee It, and where I should
find fault to correct it; whereon I answered unto his Lord-
ship that I could not amend it, but if I should so presume
I might apaire it, for it was right well and cunningly
made and translated into right good and fair English.
Notwithstanding, he willed me to oversee it, and shewed
me divers things, which, as seemed to him, might be left
! out, as divers letters, missives sent from Alexander to
' Darius and Aristotle, and each to other, which letters were
little appertinent unto dictes and sayings aforesaid, foras-
much as they specify of other matters. And also desired
me, that done, to put the said book in imprint. And thus
obeying his request and commandment, 1 have put me in
devoir to oversee this his said book, and behold as nigh as
I could how it accordeth with the original, being in French.
And I find nothing discordant therein, save only in the
DICTES AND SATTOGS M
15 and sayings of Socrates, wherein I find that my said
■i hath left out certain and divers conclusions touching
iiiiiiien. Whereof I marvel that my Lord hath not written
tiiem, ne what hath moved him so to do, ne what cause
h[ had at that time ; but I suppose tliat some fair lady hath
desired him to leave it out of his book; or else he was
amorous on some noble lady, for whose love he would not
set it in his book; or else for the very affection, love, and
good will that he hath unto all ladies and gentlewomen, he
thought that Socrates spared the sooth and wrote of women
more than truth; which I cannot think that so true a man
uid so noble a philosopher as Socrates was should write
Otherwise than truth. For if he had made fault in writing
of women, he ought not, ne should not, be believed in his
other dictes and sayings. But I perceive that my said
Lord knoweth verily that such defaults be not had ne found
in the women bom and dwelling in these parts ne regions
of the world, Socrates was a Greek, born in a far country
from hence, which country is all of other conditions than
this is. and men and women of other nature than they be
here in this country. For I wot well, of whatsoever con-
dition women be in Greece, the women of this country be
right good, wise, pleasant, humble, discreet, sober, chaste,
obedient to their husbands, true, secret, steadfast, ever busy,
and never idle, attemperate in speaking, and virtuous in all
their works — or at least should be so. For which causes
So evident my said Lord, as I suppose, thought it was not
of necessity to set in his book the sayings of his author
Socrates touching women. But forasmuch as I had com-
mandment of ray said IJDrd to correct and amend where
I should find fault, and other find t none save that he hath
left out these dictes and sayings of the women of Greece.
therefore in accomplishing his commandment — forasmuch
as I am not certain whether it was in my Lord's copy or not,
or else, peradventure, that the wind had blown over the leaf
at the time of translation of his book — I purpose to write
those same sayings of that Greek Socrates, which wrote of
the women of Greece and nothing of them of this royaume,
whom, I suppose, he never knew; for if he had. I dare
piainfy say that he would have reserved them specially in
VnXIAM CAXTON
his uid dictes. Always not presuming to put and s«t thefl)
in my said Lord's book but in the end apart in the reheaml
of the works, humbly requiring ail thetn that shall read thu
Iitd« rehearsal, that if they find any fault to arette it U
Socrates, and not to roe, which writeth as hereafter fol-
io we th.
Socrates said that women t>e the apparels to catch mei^
but they take none but them that will be poor or else Ihein
that know them not. And he said that there is none sq
great empechemenf unto a man as ignorance and women,
And he saw a woman that bare fire, of whom he said that
the hotter bore the colder. And he saw a woman sick, oi
whom he said that the evil resteth and dwelleth with th*
evil. And he saw a woman brought to the justice, and
many other women followed her weeping, of whom he sai4
the evil be sorry and angry because the evil shall perislk
And he saw a young maid that learned to write, of whon
he said that men multiplied evil upon evil. And he said
that the ignorance of a man is known in three things, that
is to wit, when he hath no thought to use reason i when
he cannot refrain his covetise; and when he is governed
by the counsel of women, in that he knoweth that th^
know not. And he said unto his disciples: "Will ye (h^
T cnseign and teach you how ye shall now escape from alt
evil ?" And they answered, "Yea," And then he said to.
them, "For whatsoever thing that it be, keep you and be welt
ware that ye obey not women." Who answered to him
again, "And what sayest thou by our good mothers, anij
of our sisters?" He said to them, "Suffice you with that
I have said to you, for all be semblable in malice." And
he said, "Whosoever will acquire and get science. let him
never put him in the governance of a woman." And he savf
a woman that made her fresh and gay, to whom he sai<li
" Thou resetnblest the fire ; for the more wood is laid tq
the fire the more will it bum, and the greater is the heat.'
And on a lime one asked him what him semed of women:
he answered that the women resemble a tree called Edelllai
which is the fairest tree to behold and see that may be, bnl
within it is full of venom. And they said to him and
demanded wherefore he blamed so women? and that bt
DKTTES AND SAYINGS «
HiDMlf had not come into this world, ne none other men
ilso, without them. He answered, "The woman is like
unto a tree named Chassoygnet, on which tree there be
moy things sharp and pricking, which hurt and prick them
that approach unto it ; and yet, nevertheless, that same
tree bringeth forth good dates and sweet." And they
dtmanded him why he fled from the women? And he
aoswered, "Forasmuch as I see them ilee and eschew the
good and commonly do evil." And a woman said to him,
"Wilt thou have any other woman than me?" And he
answered to her, " Art not ashamed to offer thyself to
ftim that demandeth nor desireth thee not?"
So, these be the dictes and sayings of the philosopher
Socrates, which he wrote in his book; and certainly he
Wote no worse than afore is rehearsed. And forasmuch
*> it is accordant that his dictes and sayings should be had
*s Well as others', therefore I have set it in the end of this
mofc. And also some persons, peradventure, that have read
this book in French would have arette a great default in me
that I had not done my devoir in visiting and overseeing of
my Lord's book according to his desire. And some other
also, haply, might have supposed that Socrates had written
much more ill of women than here afore is specified, where-
fore in satisfying of all parties, and also for excuse of the
said Socrates, I have set these said dictes and sayings apart
in the end of this book, to the intent that if my said lord or
any other person, whatsoever he or she be that shall read or
hear it, that if they be not well pleased withal, that they
with a pen race it out, or else rend the leaf out of the book.
HtMnMy requiring and beseeching my said lord to take no
displeasure on me so presuming, but to pardon whereas he
shall find fault; and that it please him to take the labour of
the imprinting in gree and thanks, which gladly have done
™y diligence in the accomplishing of his desire and com-
mandment; in which I am bounden so to do for the good
reward that I have received of his said lordship; whom T
beseech Almighty God to increase and to continue in his
wrtuous disposition in this world, and after tliis life to live
^'•rlastingly in Heaven. Amen.
WnXTAH OAXTOtr
GOLDEN LEGEND.
First Edition (1483). Pbologub
The Holy and blessed doctor Saint Jerome salth this
Buthority, " Do always some good work to the end that
the devil find thee not Idle," And the holy doctor Saint
Austin saith in the book of the labour of monks, that no
man strong or mighty to labour ought to be idle ; for which
cause when I had performed and accomplished divers
works and histories translated out of French into English at
the request of certain lords, ladies, and gentlemen, as the
Recuyel of the History of Troy, the Book of the Chess,
the History of Jason, the history of the Mirror of the
World, the 15 books of Metamorphoses in wliich be con-
tained the fables of Ovid, and the History of Godfrey of
Boulogne in the conquest of Jerusalem, with other divers
works and books, I ne wist what work to begin and put
forth after the said works to-fore made. And forasmuch
as idleness is so much blamed, as saith Saint Bernard, the
mellifluous doctor, that she is mother of lies and step-dame
of virtues, and it is she that overthroweth strong men into
sin, quencheth virtue, nourisheth pride, and maketh the
way ready to go to hell ; and John Cassiodorus saith that the
thought of him that is idle thinketh on none other thing but
on licoroua meats and viands for his belly ; and the holy
Saint Bernard aforesaid saith in an epistle, when the
time shall come that it shall behove us to render and give
accounts of our idle time, what reason may we render or
what answer shall we give when in idleness is none excuse;
and Prosper saith that whosoever liveth in idleness liveth in
■ manner of a dumb beast. And because I have seen the
authorities that blame and despise so much idleness, and also
know well that it is one of the capital and deadly sins much
hateful unto God, therefore I have concluded and firmly
purposed in myself no more to be idle, but wi!l apply my;
to labour and such occupation as I have been accustomed to
do. And forasmuch as Saint Austin aforesaid saith upon
a psalut that good work ought not to be done for fear of
CATOW
IS
but for the love of righteousness, and that it be of
and sovereign franchise, and because me-seeroeth to
le 8 sovereign weal to incite and exhort men and women
to keep them from sloth and idleness, and to let to be
understood to such people as be not lettered the nativities,
tilt lives, the passions, the miracles, and the death of the
tidy saints, and also some other notorious deeds and acts
of times past, I have submised myself to translate into
English the legend of Saints, which is called Legenda Aurea
in Latin, that is to say, the Golden Legend; for in like wise
as gold is most noble above all other metals, in like wise is
tiiis legend h olden most noble above all other works.
Against me here might some persons say that this legend
hath been translated before, and truth it is; but foras-
much as I had by me a legend in French, another in Latin,
and the third in English, which varied in many and divers
places, and also many histories were comprised in the two
other books which were not in the English books; and
therefore I have written one out of the said three books,
which I have ordered otherwise than the said English
legend is, which was so to-fore made, beseeching all ihem
that shall see or hear it read to pardon rae where 1 have
erred or made fault, which, if any be, is of ignorance and
against my will ; and submit it wholly of such as can and
may, to correct it, humbly beseeching them so to do, and in
so doing they shall deserve a singular iaud and merit ; and
1 shall pray for them unio Almighty God that He of His
benign grace reward them, etc., and that it profit to all them
that shall read or hear it read, and may increase in them
virtue, and expel vice and sin, that by the example of the
holy saints amend their living here in this short life, that
by their merits they and I may come to everlasting life and
jblifis ID Heaven. Amen.
CATON Ci483>
beglnncth the prologue of proem of the book
, Catott, which book hath been translated into En-
WHXIAM CAXTON
giish by Master Benct Burgh, late Ardideacon of Col-
chester, and high canon of St. Stephen's at Westminster,
which fill craftily haih made it in ballad royal for the erudi-
tion of my lord Bousher, son and heir at that time to my lord
die Earl of Essex. And because of late came to my hand a
book of the said Calo in French, which rehearseth many a
fair learning and notable examples, I have translated it out
of French into English, as all along hereafter shall appear,
which I present unto the city of London.
Unto the noble, ancient, and renowned city, the city of
London, in England, I, William Caxton, citizen and con-
jury of the same, and of the fraternity and fellowship of the
mercery, owe of right my service and good will, and of
TCry duty am bounden naturally to assist, aid, and counsel,
as far forth as I can to my power, as to my mother of
whom I have received my nurture and living, and shall
pray for the good prosperity and policy of the same during
my life. For, as me-seemeth, it is of great need, because
I have known it in my young age much more wealthy,
prosperous, and richer, than it is at this day. And tlie
cause is that there is almost none that intendeth to the
common weal, but only every man for his singular profit
Oh ! when 1 remember the noble Romans, that for the
common weal of the city of Rome they spent not only their
moveable goods but they put their bodies and lives in
jeopardy and to the death, as by many a noble example
we may see in the acts of Romans, as of the two noble
Scipios, African and Asian, Actilius, and many others. And
among all others the noble Cato, author and maker of this
bo<^, which he hath left for to remain ever to all the people
for to learn in it and to know how every man ought to rule
and govern him in this life, as well for the life temporal as
for the life spiritual. And as in my judgement it is the
best book for to be taught to young children in school, and
also to people of every age, it is full convenient if it be well
understood. And because I sec that the t-.-ildren that be
born within the said city increase, and profit not like their
fathers and elders, but for the most part after that they be
come to their perfect years of discretion and ripeness of
age, how well that their fathers ha\-e left to them great
CATON 17
quantity of goods yet scarcely among ten two thrive,
[whereas] I have seen and know in other lands in divers
cities that of one name and lineage successively have en-
dured prosperously many heirs, yea, a five or six hundred
j-ears, and some a thousand; and in this noble city of Lon-
don it can unneth continue unto tiie third heir or scarcely
to the second, — O blessed Lord, when I remember this I am
all abashed; I cannot Judge the cause, but fairer ne wiser
ne better spoken children in their youth be nowhere than
there be in London, but at their full ripening there is no
kernel ne good com found, but chaff for the most part. I
wot well there be many noble and wise, and prove well and
be better and richer than ever were their fathers, And to
the end that many might come to honour and worship, I
intend to translate this said book of Cato, in which I doubt
not, and if they will read it and understand they shall
much the better con rule themselves thereby; for among
all other books this is a singular book, and may well be
called the regiment or governance of the body and soul.
There was a noble clerk named Pogius of Florence, and
was secretary to Pope Eugene and also to Pope Nicholas,
which had in the city of Florence a noble and well-stufEed
library which all noble strangers coming to Florence desired
to see; and therein they found many noble and rare books.
And when they had asked of him which was the best book
of them all, and that he reputed for best, he said that he
held Cato glosed for the best book of his library. Then
since that he that was so noble a clerk held this book for
the best, doubtless it must follow that this is a noble book
and a virtuous, and such one that a man may eschew all
vices and ensue virtue. Then to the end that this said book
may pro6t nnto the hearers of it, I beseech Almighty God
that I may achieve and accomplish it unto his laud and glory,
and to the erudition and learning of them that be ignorant,
that they may thereby profit and be the better. And I re-
quire and beseecli all such that find fault or error, that of
_^beir charity they correct and amend it, and I shall heartily
" ray for them to Almighty God, that he reward them.
WltXlAM CAXTON
AESOP. (1483)
Now then I will 6nish all thes
fables
vith this tale t
k
foUaweth, which a worshipful priest and a parson told
me lately. He said that there were dwelling in Ox-
ford two priests, both masters of art, of whom lliat one
was quick and could put himself forth, and that other was a
good simple priest. And so it happened that the master that
was pert and quick, was anon promoted to a benefice or twain,
and after to prebends and for to be a dean of a great
prince's chapel, supposing and weening that his fellow the
simple priest should never have been promoted, but be
alway an Annual, or at the most a parish priest. So after
long time that this worshipful man, this dean, came riding
into a good parish with a ten or twelve horses, like a pre-
late, and came into the church of the said parish, and found
there this good simple man sometime his fellow, which
came and welcomed him lowly; and that other bad him
"good morrow, master John," and took him slightly by the
hand, and asked him where he dwelt. And the good man
said, " In this parish." " How," said he, " are ye here a
eoul priest or a parish priest?" "Nay, sir," said he,
"for lack of a better, though I be not able ne worthy, I
am parson and curate of this parish." And then that
other availed his bonnet and said, " Master parson, I pray
you to be not displeased; I had supposed ye had not been
beneficed; but master," said he, "I pray you what is this
benefice worth to you a year?" "Forsooth," said the good
simple man, " I wot never, for I make never accounts
thereof how well I have had it four or five years." "And
know ye not," said he, "what it is worth? it should seem
a good benefice." " No, forsooth," said he, " but I wot
well what it shall be worth to me." " Why," said he, " what
shall it be worth ? " " Forsooth," said he, " if I do my
true diligence in the cure of my parishioners in preach-
ing and teaching, and do my part longing to my citre, I
shall have heaven therefore; and if their souls be lost, or
CANTERBURY TALES 19
any of them by my default, I shall be punished therefore, and
hereof am I sore." And with that word the rich dean
was abashed, and thought he should do the better and
take more heed to his cures and benefices than he had
done. This was a good answer of a good priest and an
honest. And herewith I finished this book, transiaied and
printed by me, William Caxton, at Westminster in the
Abbey, and finished the z6th day of March, the year of our
Lord 1484, and the first year of the reign of King Richard
the Third.
CHAUCER'S CANTERBURY TALES
Second Edition. (1484)
PllOEM
UiT thanks, laud, and honour ought to be given unto
t clerks, poets, and historiographs that have written many
^le books of wisedom of the lives, passions, and mir-
. of holy saints, of histories of noble and famous
1 and faites, and of the chronicles since the beginning of
. of the world unto this present time, by which we
Ldaily informed and have knowledge of many things of
E should not have known if they bad not left to us
^r monuments written. Among whom and in especial
e all others, we ought to give a singular laud unto that
ble and great philosopher Geoffrey Chaucer, the which for
B ornate writing in our tongue may well have the name of
t laureate poet. For to-fore that he by labour embellished,
ornated, and made fair our English, in this realm was had
rude speech and incongruous, as yet it appeareth by old
books, which at this day ought not to have place ne be
compared among, ne to, his beauteous volumes and ornate
writings, of whom he made many books and treatises of
many a noble history, as well in metre as in rhyme and
prose; and them so craftily made that he comprehended his
matters in short, quick, and high sentences, eschewing pro-
lixity, casting away the chaff of superfluity, and shewing
the picked grain of sentence uttered by crafty and sugared
20 WILLIAM CAXTON
eloquence; of whom among all others of his books 1 pur*
pose to print, by tlic grace of God, the book of the tales ol
Canterbury, in which I find many a noble history of everf
state and degree; first rehearsing ihc conditions and th«
array of each of tliem as properly as possible is to be saidi
And after their tales which be of nobleness, wisdom, gen-
tleness, mirth and also of very holiness and virtue, wherciU!
he finisheth this said book, which book I have diligently^
overseen and duly examined, to that end it be made ac«
cording unto his own making. For I find many of
said books whidi writers have abridged it, and many things:
left out ; and in some place have set certain verses that
he never made ne set in his book; of which books so incor-
rect was one brought to roe, 6 years past, which I supposed'
had been very true and correct; and according to th«
same I did so imprint a certain number of them, which
anon were sold to many and divers gentlemen, of whom one
gentleman came to me and said that this book was noft
according in many place unto the book that Geoffr^
Cliaucer had made. To whom I answered that I had made
it according to my copy, and by me was nothing added ne
minished. Then he said he knew a book which his father
had and much loved, that was very true and according unttf
his own first book by him made; and said more, it I would!
imprint it again he would get me the same book for a copy,
howbeit he wist well that his father would not gladly depart
from it. To whom I said, in case that he could get me sucll
a book, true and correct, yet I would once endeavour me tO
imprint it again for to satisfy the author, whereas before byi
ignorance I erred in hurting and defaming his book in
divers places, in setting in some things that he never said;
ne made, and leaving out many things that he made which
be requisite to be set in it. And thus we fell at accord,
and he full gently got of his father the said book, and
delivered it to me, by which I have corrected my book, as'
hereafter, all along by the aid of Almighty God, shall
follow; whom I humbly beseech to give me grace and aid'
to achieve and accomplish to his laud, honour, and glory;,
and that all ye that shall in this book read or hear, will of
your charity among your deeds of mercy remember the soul'
MALORY'S KING ARTHUR 21
of the said Geoffrey Chaucer, first author and maker of this
book. And also tliat all we that shall see and read therein
may so take and understand the good and virtuous tales,
that it may so pro6t unto the health of our souls that after
this short and transitory life we may come to everlasting
life in Heaven. Amen,
By William Caxton
W
MALORY'S KING ARTHUR.
Prologue
Atter that I had accomplished and 6nished divers his-
tories, as well of contemplation as of other historical and
worldly acts of great conquerors and princes, and also
certain books of ensamples and doctrine, many noble and
divers gentlemen of this realm of England came and de-
manded me many and oft times wherefore that I have
not done made and printed the noble history of the Saint
Graal, and of the most renowned Christian King, first and
chief of the three best Christian and worthy, Arthur, which
ought most to be remembered among us Englishmen be-
fore all other Christian Kings. For it is noloyrly known
through the universal world that there be nine worthy
and the best that ever were; that is to wit three Paynims,
three Jews, and three Christian men. As for the Paynims,
they were to-fore the Incarnation of Christ, which were
named — tlie first, Hector of Troy, of whom the history is
come both in ballad and in prose — the second, Alexander
the Great; and the third, Julius Caesar, Emperor of Rome,
of whom the histories be well known and had. And as
for the three Jews, which also were before the Incarnation
of our Lord of whom the first was Duke Joshua, which
brought the children of Israel into the land of behest;
the second, David. King of Jerusalem: and the third Judas
Maccabreus; of these three the Bible rehearseth all their
noble histories and acts. And since the said Incarnation
have been three noble Christian men, installed and admitted
through the universal world into the number of the nine
best and worthy, of whom was first the noble Arthur, whose
f
WHXIAM CAXTON
noble acts I purpose to write in this present book hcr«
following. The second was Charlemagne, or Charles the
Great, of whom the history is had in many places both in
French and English; and tlie third and last was Godfrey
of Boulogne, of whose acts and life I made a book unto the
excellent prince and king of noble memory. King Edward
the Fourth. The said noble gentlemen instantly required
me to print the history oE the said noble king and conqueror.
King Arthur, and of his knights, with the history of the
Saint Graal, and of the death and ending of the said Arthur,
affirming that I ought rather to print his acts and noble
feats than of Godfrey of Boulogne or any of the other
eight, considering that he was a man bom within this realm,
and king and emperor of the same; and that there be in
French divers and many noble volumes of his acts, and also
of his knights. To whom I answered that divers men hold
opinion that there was no such .'\rthur, and that all such
books as be made of him be but feigned and fables, because
that some chronicles make of him no mention, ne remember
him nothing ne of his knights; whereto they answered, and
one in special said, that in him that should say or think that
there was never such a king called Arthur, might well be
aretted great folly and blindness ; for he said that there were
many evidences of the contrary. First ye may see his sep-
ulchre in the monastery of Glastonbury; and also in ' Poly-
chronicon,' in the fifth book, the sixth chapter, and in the
seventh book, the twenty-third chapter, where his body was
buried, and after found and translated into the said mon-
astery. Ye shall see also in the history of Boccaccio, in
his book 'De casu principum,' part of his noble acts and
also of his fall. Also Galfridus in his British book re-
counteth his life, and in divers places of England many
remembrances he yet of him, and shall remain perpetually,
and also of his knights. First in the Abbey of West-
minster at Saint Edward's shrine remaineth the print of
his seal in red wax closed in beryl, in which is written
'Patricius Arlhurus. Brilanniae Galliae Germaniae Daciae
Imperator.' Item, in the castle of Dover ye may see
Gawain's skull and Caradoc's mantle; at Winchester the
round table; in other places X^acelot's swoid, and maay
otfier things. Then all these things considered, there can
flo man reasonably gainsay but here was a king of this
Jand named Arthur ; for in all places, Christian and heathen,
he IS reputed and taken for one of the nine worthy, and
the first of the three Christian men. And also he is more
spoken of beyond the sea; more books made of his noble
acts than there be in England, as well in Dutch, Italian,
Spanish, and Greek as in French ; and yet of record re-
main in witness of him in Wales in the town of Camelot
the great stones and marvellous works of iron lying under
the ground, and royal vaults, which divers now living
liath seen. Wherefore it is a marvel why he is no more
renowned in his own country, save only it accordeth to
the word of God, which sailh that no man is accepted
for a prophet in his own country. Then all these things
aforesaid alleged, I could not well deny but that there
was such a noble king named Arthur, and reputed one of
the nine worthy, and first and chief of the Christian men;
and many noble volumes be made of him and of his noble
knights in French, which I have seen and read beyond the
sea, which be not had in our maternal tongue, but in
Welsh be many, and also in French, and some in English,
but nowhere nigh all. Wherefore such as have lately been
drawn out briefly into English, I have, after the simple
cunning that God hath sent to me, under the favour and
correction of all noble lords and gentlemen, emprised to
imprint a book of the noble histories of the said King
Arthur and of certain of his knights, after a copy unto
me delivered, which copy Sir Thomas Mallory did take
out of certain books of French and reduced it into En-
glish. And I according to my copy have down set it in
print, to the intent that noble men may see and learn the
noble acts of chivalry, the gentle and virtuous deeds that
some knights used in those days, by which they came
to honour, and how they that were vicious were punished
and oft put to shame and rebuke ; humbly beseeching all
□oble lords and ladies and all other estates, of what estate
or degree they be of, that shall see and read in this said
took and work, that they take the good and honest acts ia
remembrance and to follow the same, wherein they
WILLIAM CAXTON"
shall find many joyous and pleasant histories and nohle and
renowned acts of humanity, gentleness, and chivalry. For
herein may^ be seen noble chivalry, courtesy, humanity,
friendliness, hardyhood, love, friendship, cowardice, mur-
der, hate, virtue and sin. Do after the good and leave
the evil, and it shall bring' you to good fame and renown.
And for to pass the time this book shall be pleasant to
read in; but for to give faith and believe that all is true
that is conlained herein, ye be at your liberty. But all
is written for our doctrine, and for to beware that we
f^U not to vice ne sin, but to exercise and follow virtue,
by which we may come and attain to good fame and renowm
in this life, and after this short and transitory life to
come unto everlasting bliss in heaven; the which He grant
us that reigneth in Heaven, the Blessed Trinity, Amen.
Then to proceed forth in this said book which I direct
unto all noble princes, lords and ladies, gentlemen or gen-
tlewomen, that desire to read or hear read of the noble
and joyous history of the great conqueror and excellent
king. King Arthur, sometime King of this noble realm then-
called Britain, I, William Caxlon, simple person, present
this hook following which I have emprised to imprint.
And treateth of the noble acts, feals of arms, of chivalry,
prowess, hardihood, humanity, love, courtesy, and very gen-
tleness, with many wonderful histories and adventures.
And for to understand briefly the contents of this volume, X
have divided it into 21 books, and every book chaptered,
as hereafter shall by God's grace follow. The first book
shall treat how Uther Pendragon begat the noble conqueror.
King Arthur, and containeth 28 chapters. The second
book treateth of Balyn the noble knight, and containeth ig
chapters. The third book treateth of the marriage of King^,
Arthur to Queen Guinevere, with other matters, and con-
taineth 15 chapters. The fourth book how Merlin wa«.
assotted, and of war made to King Arthur, and containeth
29 chapters. The fiflh book treateth of the conquest of
Lucius the emperor, and containeth 12 chapters. The sixth
book treateth of Sir Lancelot and Sir Lionel, and marvel-
lous adventures, and containeth 18 chapters. The seventh
book treateth of a noble knight called Sir Garetfa, and
MALOHrS KING ARTHUR
25
d by Sir Kay ' Beaumains,' and containeth 36 chapters,
ine (ighth book treateth of the birth of Sir Tristram
tbe noble knight, and of his acts, nnd containeth 41 chapters.
The ninth book treateth of a knight named by Sir Kay,
'Le cote mal taille,' and also of Sir Tristram, and con-
taineth 44 chapters. The tenth book treateth of Sir Tris-
Cram, and other marvellous adventures, and containeth 83
chapters. The eleventh book treateth of Sir Lancelot and
Sir Galahad, and containeth 14 chapters. The twelfth
ibook treateth of Sir Lancelot and his madness, and con-
taineth 14 chapters. The thirteenth book treateth how
Gaiahad came first to King Arthur's court, and the quest
how the Sang real was begun, and containeth 20 chapters.
The fourteenth book treateth of the quest of the Sangreal,
and containeth 10 chapters. The fifteenth hook treateth
of Sir Lancelot, and containeth 6 chapters. The six-
teenth book treateth of Sir Boris and Sir Lionel his brother,
aod containeth 17 chapters. The seventeenth book treat-
eth of the Sangreal, and containeth 23 chapters. The
eighteenth book treateth of Sir Lancelot and the Queen,
and containeth 25 chapters. The nineteenth book treateth
of Queen Guinevere, and Lancelot, and containeth 13
chapters. The twentietlj book treateth of the piteous death
of Arthur, and containeth 22 chapters. The twenty-first
book treateth of his last departing, and how Sir Lancelot
came to revenge his death, and containeth 13 chapters.
The sum is 21 books, which contain the sum of five hun-
dred and seven chapters, as more plainly shall follow here-
after.
^H ENEYDOS (1490)
^^ Prologue
Aftsr divers work made, translated, and achieved, having
no work in hand, I sitting ia my study whereas lay many
div«rs pamphlets and books, happened that to my hand
cane a iittle book in French, which lately was translated
out of Latin by some noble clerk of France, which book is
1 Aeneidos, made in Latin by that noble poet and
WILLIAM CAXTON
great clerk, Virgil. Which book I saw over, and rea
therein how, after the general destruction of the greal Tro^'r
Aeneas departed, bearing his old father Anchises upon H- is
shoulders, his little son lulus on his hand, his wife wifc^
much other people following, and how he shipped and <^^H
parted, with all the history of his adventures that he ha^H
ere he came to the achievement of his conquest of It^l:^ff|
as all along shall be shewed in his present book. In wbic^
book I had great pleasure because of the fair and honesi
terms and words in French; which I never saw before
like, ne none so pleasant ne so well ordered; which bool^
as seemed to me should be much requisite to noble i ^^
to see, as well for the eloquence as the histories. Hos
well that many hundred years past was the said book ol
Aeticidos, with other works, made and learned daily '
schools, especially in Italy and other places; which histot;
* the said Virgil made in metre. And when I had advise
me in this said book, I delibered and concluded to tranl
late it into English ; and forthwith took a pen and inj
and wrote a leaf or twain, which I oversaw again to cot
rect it. And when I saw the fair and strange terms therein
I doubted that it should not please some gentlemen whic^
late blamed me, saying that in my translations I had over
curious terms, which could not be understood of common
people, and desired me to use old and homely terms i
my translations. And fain would I satisfy every ma
and so to do took an old book and read therein, and ce
tainly the English was so rude and broad that I coul
not well understood it. And also my Lord Abbot of West-'
minster did do show to me lately certain evidences written
in old English, for to reduce it into our English now used.
And certainly it was written in such wise tliat i
like to Dutch than English, I could not reduce ne bring if
to be understood. And certainly our language now used
varieth far from that which was used and spoken when I
was bom. For we Englishmen be born under the domina-
tion of the moon, which is never steadfast but ever wavering
waxing one season and waneth and dec re a set h another
season. And that common English that is spoken in one
shire varieth from another, insomuch that in my days
VIRGIL'S ENEYDOS
luppened that certain merchants were in a ship in Thames
ioc to have sailed over the sea into Zealand, and for lack
of wind they tarried at Foreland, and went to land for to
refresh them. And one of them named Sheffield, a mercer,
csme into a house and asked for meat, and especially he
ssked after eggs; and the good wife answered that she
could speak no French, and the merchant was angry, for he
also could speak no French, hut would have had eggs, and
ibe understood him not. And then at last another said,
that he would have "eyren"; then the goodwife said that
she understood him well. Lo, what should a man in these
days now write, eggs or eyren? Certainly it is hard to
pitase every man because of diversity and change of lan-
guage, For in these days every man that ts in any reputa-
tion in his country will utter his communication and mat-
tera in such manners and terms that few men shall un-
derstand them. And some honest and great clerks have
been with me and desired me to write the most curious
terms that I could iind; and thus between plain, rude and
curious I stand abashed. But in my judgment the common
terms that be daily used be lighter to be understood than the
old and ancient English. And forasmuch as this present
book is not for a rude uplandish man to labour therein
ne read it, but only for a clerk and a nohle gentleman
that feeleth and understandeth in teats of arms, in love
and in noble chivalry. Therefore in a mean between both
1 have reduced and translated this said book into our English,
not over-rude ne curious; but in such terms as shall he
onderstood. by God's grace, according to my copy. And
if any man will intermit in reading of it, and Sndeth
such terms that he cannot understand, let him go read
and learn Virgil of the pisties of Ovid, and there he shall
see and understand lightly all, if He have a good reader
and informer. For this book is not for every rude and
uncunning man to see, but to clerks and very gentlemen
that understand gentleness and science. Then I pray all
them that shall read in this little treatise to hold me for
excused for the translating of it, for I acknowledge myself
ignorant of cunning to emprise on me so high and noble
a work. But I pray Master John Skelton, late created
38 WTLLIAM CAXTON
poet laureate in ihe University of Oxenford, to oversee I
and correct this said book, and to address and expound, I
wherever shall be found fault, to them that shall require it 1
Far him 1 know for sufiicient to expound and English 1
every difficulty that is therein; for he hath lately trans- 1
lated the Epistles of Tully, and the book of Diodorus !
Siculus, and divers other works out of Latin into English,
not in rude and old language, but in polished and ornate ■
terras craftily, as he that hath read Virgil, Ovid, Tully,
and all the other noble poets and orators to me unknown^
And also he hath read the nine Muses, and understand)
their musical sciences, and to whom of them each science
is appropred. I suppose he hath drunken of Helicon's
well. Then I pray him and such others to correct, add.
or mtnish whereas he or they shall find fault; for I have but
followed my copy in French as nigh as to me is possible^
And if any word be said therein well, I am glad; and if
otherwise, I submit my said book to their correction. Which
book I present tuito the high born, my to-coming natural
and sovereign lord Arthur, by the grace of God Prince
of Wales, Duke of Cornwall and Earl of Chester, first-
begotten son and heir unto our most dread natural and
sovereign lord and most Christian King, Henry the VII,^
by the grace of God King of England and of France,,
and lord of Ireland; beseeching his noble Grace to receive,
it in thank of me his most humble subject and servanL.
And I shall pray unto Almighty God for his prosperous-
increasing in virtue, wisedom. and humanity, that he mayj
be equal with the most renowned of all his noble pro-'
genilors; and so to live in this present life that after this,
transitory life he and we all may come to everlasting U£#
in Heaven. Amen.
DEDICATION
OF THE INSTITUTES OF
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION
BY JOHN CALVIN (1536)
Iffis Most Christian Majesty, FRANCIS, King of the
French, and his Sovereign, John Calvin wisheth peace
ind salvation in Christ
''HEN I be^n this work. Sire, nothing was further
from my thoughts than writing a book which
would afterwards be presented to your Majesty.
My intention was only to lay down some elementary prin-
ciples, by which inquirers on the subject of reli^on might
be instructed in the nature of true piety. And this labour
I undertook chiefly for my countrymen, the French, of
whom I apprehended multitudes to he hungering and thirst-
ing after Christ, but saw very few possessing any real
[cTtowledge of him. That this was my design, the book
itself proves by its simple method and unadorned com-
position. But when I perceived that the fury of certain
wrfcked men in your kingdom had grown to such a height,
as to leave no room in the land for sound doctrine, I
thought I should be usefully employed, if in the same work
I delivered my instructions to them, and exhibited my
confession to you, that you may know the nature of that
doctrine, which is the object of such unbounded rage to
those madmen who are now disturbing the country with
fire and sword. For I shall not be afraid to acknowledge,
that this treatise contains a summary of that very doctrine,
/ebn Calyh
■ jG4- He joined ihe Rrfor
JOBV C&LYlIf
s to bef
aad to fee cocranmcd tmat the facK of die caith.
know widi what attoci on a JBiiiiMti oo j joar em haw
fiOed bf dMn, ts Older lo fcoder oar cansc nost
ia jOftr mean; bid yoor ckxBcncjr sbotUd lead jroa 1
eoiuider lint, U accttsation be accoooted a wrfBcicot
dcncc of foilt, there will be an end of aS inaocencc in «
•ad actioiu. If anr one, indeed, with a view I
odtum upon tbe doctrine which I am eodean
fend, fbonld ailcfc that it has long ago been <
bjr the ceaeraJ cofueot, aad suppressed by man; |
dccbiMU, this will be only e^iuTalect to saying,
hai been fometinKs riolently rejected through the infloenoi
and power of its adversaries, and sometimes insidionsl]^
and fraudulently oppressed by falsehoods, artifices, '
calnumici. Violence is displayed, when sanguinary :
tencca are passed against it without the cause being heard^
•ad fraud, when it is ttnjustly accused of sedition i
mischief. I^st any one should suppose that these our coiii<|i]
ptaJati arc unfounded, you yourself. Sire, can bear wttnessfl
of the false calumnies with which you hear it daily tra-l
duccd; that its only tendency is to wrest the sceptres ofl
kings out of their hands, to overturn all the tribunals andl
Judicial proceedings, to subvert all order and governments, ■
to disturb the peace and tranquillity of the people, to ab-fl
rogale all laws, to scatter all properties and possessionsi^ T
and, in a word, to involve every thing tn total conEusioa.!
And yet you hear the smallest portion of what is alleged
against it; for such horrible things are circulated among!
the vulgar, that, if tliey were true, the whole world wouldl
Justly pronounce it and its abettors worthy of a thousand!
fires and gibbets. Wlio, then, will wonder at its becoming I
the object of public odium, where credit is given to sucl) |
mott inir[uiloUB accusations? This is the cause
general consent and conspiracy to condemn us and oucJ
doctrine. Hurried away with this impulse, those wha-1
■it in Judgment pronounce for sentences the prejudices they*
brought from home with them; and think their duty fully I
discharged if they condcuui none to be punished but suchi
TO THE INSTITUTES
as are convicted by their own confession, or by sufficient
proofs. Convicted of what crime? Of this condemned
(foctrine, they say. But with what justice is it condemned?
Now, the ground of defence was not to abjure the doctrine
ilfdf, but to maintain its truth. On tliis subject, however,
word is allowed to be uttered.
irefore I beseech you, Sire,— and surely it is not an
inable request, — to take upon yourself the entire
:ance of this cause, which has hitherto been cod-
ftlsedly and carelessly agitated, without any order of law, and
with outrageous passion rather than judicial gravity. Think
apt that I am now meditating my own individual defence,
m order to effect a safe return to my native country; for,
though I feel the affection which every man.ought to feel for
it, yet, under the existing circumstances, I regret not my re-
moval from it But I plead the cause of all the godly, and
consequentiy of Christ himself, which, having been in these
times persecuted and trampled on in all ways in your kirg-
doiu, now lies in a most deplorable state; and this indeed
rather through the tryanny of certain Pharisees, than with
your knowledge. How this comes to pass is foreign tg
my present purpose to say; but it certainly lies in a most
afflicted state. For the ungodly have gone to such lengths,
that the truth of Christ, if not vanquished, dissipated, and
entirely destroyed, is buried, as it were, in ignoble obscurity,
while the poor, despised church is either destroyed by cruel
massacres, or driven away into banishment, or menaced
and terrified into total silence. And still they continue
their wonted madness and ferocity, pushing violently against
ihe wall already bent, and finishing the ruin they have begun.
In the meantime, no one comes forward to plead the cause
against such furies. If there he any persons desirous of
appearing most favourable to the truth, they only venture an
opinion, that forgiveness should be extended to the error
and imprudence of ignorant people. For this is the language
of these moderate men, calling that error and imprudence
which they know to be the cerlain truth of God, and those
ignorant people, whose understanding they perceive not
to have been so despicable to Christ, but that be has favoured
tfaem with the mysteries of his heavenly wisdom. Thus all
^
I
JOHN CALVnr
; asfiftffled of the Gospel. But it shall be yours, Slrt,
not to turn away your ears or thoughts from so just a
defence, especially in a cause of such importance as the
maintenance of God's glory unimpaired in the world, the
preservation of the honor of divine truth, and the con-
tinuance of the kingdom of Christ uninjured among ux
This is a cause worthy of your attention, worthy of 3roiir
cognizance, worthy of your throne. This consideration con-
stitutes true'royalty, to acknowledge yourself in the govern-
ment of your kingdom to be the minister of God-
where the glory of God is not made the end of the govern-
ment, it is not a legitimate sovereignty, but a usurpation.
And he is deceived who e.xpects lasting prosperity in that
kingdom which is not ruled by the sceptre of God, that i^
his holy word; for that heavenly oracle cannot fail, whidi.
declares that " where there is no vision, the people perish,""
Nor should you be seduced from this pursuit by a contend'
of our meanness. We are fully conscious to ourselves how
very mean and abject we are, being miserable sinners before
God, and accounted most despicable by men; being (if you.
please) the refuse of the world, deserving of the vilest ap-
pellations that can be found; so that nothing remains for
us to glory in before God, but his mercy alone, by which,
without any merit of ours, we have been admitted to the
hope of eternal salvation, and before men nothing but our
weakness, the slightest confession of which is esteemed I
them as the greatest disgrace. But our doctrine must stand,
exalted above all the glory, and invincible by all the power
of the world; because it is not ours, but the doctrine ot
the living God, and of his Christ, whom the Father bath'
constituted King, that he may have dominion from sea to
sea, and from the fiver even to the ends of the earth, ani
that he may rule in such a manner, that the whole eartb
with its strength of iron and with its splendour of gold am
silver, smitten hy the rod of his mouth, may be broken to
pieces tike a potter's vessel ;' for thus do the prophets fore*
teJI the magnificence of his kingdom.
Our adversaries reply, that our pleading the word oi
God Is a false pretence, and that wc are nefarious COft
^Prer, xxiz. iS. 'Duiie] il. 34. iMub xi. 4. Putm iL f,
(1) HC— Vol. 8B
TO THE INSTITUTES 33
ruplers of it But that this is not only a malicious calumny,
bill egregious impudence, by reading our confession, you
win, in your wisdom, be able to judge. Yet soraetiiing fur-
ther is necessary to be said, to excite your attention, or at
least to prepare your mind for this perusal. Paul's direc-
tion, that every prophecy be framed "according to the
analogy of faith,'" has fixed an invariable standard by which
all interpretation of Scripture ought to be tried. If our
principles be examined by this rule of faith, the victory is
ours. For what is more consistent with faith than to
acknowledge ourselves naked of all virtue, that we may be
dothed by God; empty of all good, that we may be filled by
him; slaves to sin, that we may be hberated by him; blind,
that we may be enlightened by him ; lame, that we may be
guided; weak, that we may be supported by him; to divest
ourselves of all ground of glorying, that he alone may be
eminently glorious, and that we may glory in him? When
wt advance these and simiiiar sentiments, they interrupt us
with complaints that this is the way to overturn, I know not
what blind light of nature, pretended preparations, free will,
and works meritorious of eternal salvation, together with all
tiieir supererogations; because they cannot bear that the
praise and glory of ail goodness, strength, righteousness,
and wisdom, should remain entirely with God. But we read
of none being reproved for having drawn too freely from
the fountain of living waters; on the contrary, they are
severely upbraided who have " hewed them out cisterns,
broken cisterns, that can hold no water.'" Again, what
is more consistent with faith, than to assure ourselves of
God being a propitious Father, where Christ is acknowl-
edged as a brother and Mediator? than securely to expect
all prosperity and happiness from Him. whose unspeakable
love towards us went so far, that "be spared not his own
Son, but delivered him up for us?"' than to rest in the
certain expectation of salvation and eternal life, when
we reflect upon the Father's gift of Christ, in whom such
treasures are hidden? Here they oppose us, and complain
that this certainty of confidence is chargeable with arrogance
and presumption. But as we ought to presume nothing of
■ Bom. xii. 6. *J(r. li. ij. ■ Koni. fiit. 31.
(3) HC— Vol. S»
IHN CALVIW
ourseives, so we should presume every thing of God; nof J
are we divested of vain glory for any other reason thw
that we may learn to glory in the Lord. What shall I i
more? Review, Sire, al) the parts of our cause, and cc
sider us worse than the most abandoned of mankind, uif
less you clearly discover that we thus " both labor and suffer
reproach, because we trust in the living God,"* because WC
believe that " this is life eternal, to know the only true G«]i
and Jesus Christ whom he hath sent.'" For this hope s
of us are bound in chains, others are lashed with acoui
others are carried about as laughing-stocks, others are ou^
la wed, others are cruelly tortured, others escape by flight!
but we are all reduced to extreme perplexities, execrate^
with dreadful curses, cruelly slandered and treated will]
the greatest indignities. Now, look at our adversaries, (J
speak of the order of priests, at whose will and direction!
others carry on ttiese hostilities against us,) and consider I.
little with me by what principles they are actuated. Thfl
true religion, which is taught in the Scriptures, and oughjt
to be universally maintained, they readily permit both thenw
selves and others to be ignorant of, and to treat vnHf/
neglect and contempt. They think it unimportant wt)^
any one holds or denies concerning God and Christ, pro^
vided he submits his mind with an implicit failh (as tbnn
call it) to the judgment of the Church. Nor are they mucq
affected, if the glory of God happens to be violated witl|.
open blasphemies, provided no one lift a finger against the
primacy of the Apostolic See, and the authority of theif.
iioly Mother Church. Why, therefore, do they contend wiU|
such extreme bitterness and cruelty for the mass, purgatory,
pilgrimages, and similar trifles, and deny that any pie^
can be maintained without a most explicit faith, so to spe^i)^
in these things; whereas they prove none of them from thfl
word of God? Why, but because their belly is their God»
their kitchen is their religion; deprived of which they con-
sider themselves no longer as Christians, or even as men^
For though some feast themselves in splendour, and other?
subsist on slender fare, yet all live on the same pot, which,
without tliis fuel, would not only cool, but completely freeze:,
•i Tim. It. m, 'John xiii. 3.
TO THE INSTITUTES
Evny one of them, therefore, who is most solicitous lor
Us belly, is found to be a most strenuous champion for
their faith. Indeed, they universally exert themselves for
the preservation of their kingdom, and the repletion of their
beili'es; but not one of them discovers the least indication
of fincere zeal.
Nor do their attacks on our doctrine cease here; they
urge every topic of accusation and abuse to render it an
object of hatred or suspicion. They call it novel, and of
recent origin, — tiiey cavil at it as doubtful and uncertain,—
they inquire by what miracles it is confirmed, — they ask
whether it is right for it to he received contrary to the con-
sent of so many holy fathers, and the custom of the highest
antiquity,— they urge us to confess that it is schismatica!
in stirring up opposition against the Church, or that the
Church was wholly extinct for many ages, during which no
$iich thing was known. — Lastly, they say all arguments are
nonecessary; for that its nature may be determined by its
fruitB, since it has produced such a multitude of sects, so
many factions tumults, and such great licentiousness of
vices. It is indeed very easy for them to insult a deserted
cause with the credulous and ignorant multitude; but, if
we had also the liberty of speaking in our turn, this acri-
mony, which they now discover in violently foaming against
US with equal licentiousness and impunity, would presently
cool.
In the first place, their calling it novel is highly injurious
to God, whose holy word deserves not to be accused of
novelty, I have no doubt of its being new to them, to whom
Jesus Christ and the Gospel are equally new. But those
who know the antiquity of this preaching of Paul, "that
Jesus Christ died for our sins, and rose again for our justi-
Scation,'" will find no novelty among us. That it has long
been concealed, buried, and unknown, is the crime of human
impiety. Now that the goodness of God has restored it to
oa, it ought at least to be allowed its just claim of antiquity.
From the same source of ignorance springs the notion of
its being doubtful and uncertain. This is the very thing
wbich the I-ord complains of by his prophet; that "the ox
*fiom, IT. ay i Cor. it. 3, 17,
JOHN CALVIM
knowelli his owner, and the ass his master's crib,'* bill
that his people knjw not him. But however they may laagh,
at its uncertainly, if they were called to seal their own
doctrine with Vheir blood and lives, it would appear how
much they value it Very different is our confidence, which
dreads neither the terrors of death, nor even the tribunal
of God.
Their requiring miracles of us is altogether unreasonable;
for we forge no new Gospel, but retain the very same
whose truth was confirmed by all the miracles ever wrought
by Christ and the apostles. But they have this peculiar
advantage above us, that they can confirm their faith by
continual miracles even to this day. But the truth is, they
allege miracles which are calculated to unsettle a mind,
otherwise well established, they are so frivolous and
ridiculous, or vain and false. Nor, if they i
preternatural, ought they to have any weight in opposition
to the truth of God, since the name of God ought to be sanc-
tified in all places and at all times, whether by miraculous
events, or by the common order of nature. This fallacy
might perhaps be more specious, if the Scripture did not
apprize us of the legitimate end and uss of miracles. For
Mark informs us, that the miracles which followed the
preaching of the apostles were wrought in confirmation"
of it, and Luke tells us, that" " the Lord gave testimony to
the word of his grace," when " signs and wonders " were
" done by the hands " of the apostles. Very similar to which ,
is the assertion of the apostle, that " salvation was con-
firmed " by the preaching of the Gospel, " God also bearinr
witness with signs, and wonders, and divers miracles.
But those things which we are told were seals of the Gospel,
shall we pervert to undermine the faith of the Gospel?
Those things which were designed to be testimonials of the
truth, shall we accommodate to the confirmation of false-
hood? It is right, therefore, that the doctrine, which, ac-
cording to the evangelist, claims the first attention, be
examined and tried in the first place; and if it be approved,
,then it ought to derive confirmation from miracles. But
it is the characteristic of sound doctrine, given by Chris^
*lMi4liL3. "liUrkSTbStk "Acu »v. 3. "HcU iL M.
TO THE INOTITUTES ST
that it lends to promote, not the glory of men, but the
glory of God." Christ having laid down this proof of a
dodrine, it is wrong to esteem those as miracles which are
directed to any other end than the glorification of the name
of God alone. And we should remember that Satan has
Wi wonders, which, though they are juggling tricks rather
than real miracles, are such as delude the ignorant and in-
Mperienced. Magicians and enchanters have always been
famous for miracles; idolatry has been supported by aston-
ishing miracles ; and yet we admit them not as proofs of the
tnperstition of magicians or idolaters. With this engine
also the simplicity of the vulgar was anciently assailed by
flie Donatists, who abounded in miracles. We therefore
give the same answer now to our adversaries as Augusline"
gave to the Donatists, that our Lord hath cautioned us
against these miracle-mongers by his prediction, that there
(hould arise false prophets, who, by various signs and lying
wonders, "should deceive (if possible) the very elect.""
And Paul has told us, that the kingdom of Antichrist would
be "with all power, and signs, and lying wonders."" But
ibtse miracles (they say) arc wrought, not by idols, or sor-
cerers, or false prophets, but by saints ; as if we were igno-
rant, that it is a stratagem of Satan to "transform" him-
self "into an angel of light."" At the tomb of Jeremiah,"
who was buried in Egypt, the Egyptians formerly offered
sacrifices and other divine honours. Was not tliis abusing
God's holy prophet to the purposes of idolatry ? Yet they
supposed this veneration of his sepulchre to be rewarded
with a cure for the bite of serpents. What shall we say,
but that it has been, and ever will be, the most righteous
vengeance of God to " send those who receive not the love
of the truth strong delusions, that they should believe a
lie?"" We are by no means without miracles, and such
as are certain, and not liable to cavils. But those under
which they shelter themselves are mere illusions of Satan,
seducing the people from the true worship of God to vanity.
Another calumny is their charging us with opposition to
the fathers, — I mean the writers of the earlier and purer
«John viL 18. 1111. 50. "In Joan, trart. 13, "Malt iraiv. S4-
" 3 TbcM iL ». "a Cor. li. i*. " Hietom. in praef. Jcrcm.
'■aThcau ii, 10, 11.
^
JOHN OAI.VIK
Ages, — as if those writers were abettors of tlieir i
whereas, if the contest were to be terminaleil by tbU a
ily, the victory in most parts of the controversy — to speak i
the most modest terms — would be on our side. But thoug
the writings of those fathers contain many wise and exc
lent things, yet in some respects they have suffered the co
moa fate of mankind; these very dutiful children reverenc
only their errors and mistakes, but their excellences 1
either overlook, or conceal, or corrupt; so that it may t
be said to be their only study to collect dross from th« n
of gold. Then they overwhelm us with senseless c"
as despisers and enemies of the fathers. But we do not hol
them in such contempt, but that, if it were consistent «
my present design, I could easily support by their sultry
most of the sentiments that we now maintain. But wl
we make use of their writings, we always remember t
"all things are ours." to serve we, not to have <
over us, and that "we are Christ's"" alone, and owe hill
universal obedience. He who neglects this distinction ^
have nothing decided in religion; since those holy men wej
ignorant of many things, frequently at variance with ew "
other, and sometimes even inconsistent with themsetvi
There is great reason, they say, for the admonition i
Solomon, "not to transgress or remove the ancient 1
marks, which our fathers have set"" But the same rule i
not applicable to the bounding of fields, and to the obediei
of faith, which ought to be ready to "forget her own peo|
and her father's house."" But it they are so fond of allege
rizing, why do they not explain the apostles, rather than an
others, to be those fathers, whose appointed landmarks it
so unlawful to remove? For this is the interpretation fl
Jerome, whose works they have received into their canon
But if they insist on preserving the landmarks of tho
whom they understand to be intended, why do they ;
pleasure so freely transgress them themselves? There we'
two fathers," of whom one said, that our God neither ea
nor drinks, and therefore needa neither cups nor dishes
the other, that sacred things require no gold, and that gql
"1 Cor. HI. IT, 33. «P»oi. srn. i8, "Psilm iIt.
TO THE INSTITUTES 39
it no recotomendation of that which is not purchased with
gold. This landmark therefore is transgressed by those who
io sacred things are so much delighted with gold, silver,
ivory, marble, jewels, and silks, and suppose that God is not
rightly worshipped, unless all things abound in exquisite
tplendour, or rather extravagant profusion. There was a
father" who said he freely partook of flesh on a day when
Others abstained from it, because he was a Christian. They
transgress the landmarks therefore when they curse the
soul that tastes fiesli in Lent. There were two fathers," of
whom one said, that a monk who labors not with his hands is
on a level with a cheat or a robber; and the other, that it is
nolawful for monks to live on what is not their own, not-
withstanding their assiduity in contemplations, studies, and
prayers; and they have transgressed this landmark by
placing the idle and distended carcasses of monks in cells
and brothels, to be pampered on the substance of others.
There was a father" who said, that to see a painted image
of Christ, or of any other saint, in the temples of Christians,
is a dreadful abomination. Nor was this merely the sentence
of an individual; it was also decreed by an ecclesiastical
council, that the object of worship should not be painted on
the walls. ITiey are far from confining themselves within
these landmarks, for every corner is filled with images.
Another father^ has advised that, after having discharged
the office of humanity towards the dead by the rites of
sepulture, we should leave them to their repose. They break
through these landmarks by inculcating a constant solicitude
for the dead. There was one of the fathers" who asserted
that the substance of bread and wine in the eucharist ceases
not, but remains, just as the substance of the human nature
remains in the Lord Christ united with the divine. They
transgress this landmark therefore by pretending that, on
the words of the Lord being recited, the substance of bread
and wine ceases, and is transubstantiated into his body and
blood. There were fathers" who, while they exhibited to
" Spiridioo. Trip. Hist- lib. i. 0. lo.
»TrijJ. Hist, lib, 8. c. 1. Aogmt. de Opere Mon. c. 17.
"Epiph. Epiat. sb Hier. -nirs. Cor. Elibfr. c. 36.
Ji A^f. A^ *,bra. rib. I, c 7. «Gelaa. Pap. in Cone. Rnm-
I Cap. £plic«. Calix. Papa de Code. diit. 3.
JOHN CALVIN
the universal Church only one eucharist, and forbade i
scandalous and immoral persons to approach it, at the s
time severely censured all who, when present, did not par-
take of it. How far have they removed these landmarki,
when they fill not only the churches, but even private houses,
with their masses, admit all who choose to be spectators of
them, and every one the more readily in proportion to the
magnitude of his contribution, however chargeable with
impurity and wickedness! They invite none to faith I
Christ and a faithful participation of the sacraments; but
rather for purposes of gain bring forward their own worl
instead of the grace and merit of Christ. There were twa
fathers," of whom one contended that the use of Christ's
sacred supper should be wholly forbidden to those who, c
tent with partaking of one kind, abstained from the other;
the other strenuously maintained that Christian people ou^t
not to be refused the blood of their Lord, tor the canfessioq
of whom they are required to shed their own. These laiut
marks also they have removed, in appointing, by an :
violable law, that very thing which the former punished with
excommunication, and the latter gave a powerful reason ior
disapproving. There was a father" who asserted the
temerity of deciding on either side of an obscure subject
without clear and evident testimonies of Scripture. This
landmark they forgot when they made so many constitutionj,
canons, and judicial determinations, without any author!^
from the word of God. There was a father" who upbraided
Montanus with having, among other heresies, been the firs)
imposer of laws for the observance of fasts. They hav<
gone far beyond this landmark also, in establishing fasti
by the strictest laws. There was a father" who denied tbft)
marriage ought to be forbidden to the ministers of tin
Church, and pronounced cohabitation with a wife to be rerf
chastity; and there were fathers who assented to hia judf
ment. They have transgressed these landmarks by enjoinin)
on their priests the strictest celibacy. There was a fathei
who thought that attention should be paid to Christ only, oj
"GelDB. cu. Comperimas dc ConB. dio. 3. Cypi. EpiM. i, lib. i, deL
"Atmiit. lib. 1. de Pec. Mer. cap. ult.
■Apolloa. At ituo Ecd, Hiit. lib, 5, cap. it, 11.
"Aphnnt. Tcip. HlK. lib. a, c 14. Cypr. EpiK. a
TO THE INSTITUTES 41
whom it is said. " Hear ye him," and that no re^rd should
be had to what others before us have either said or done,
only to what has been commanded by Christ, who is pre*
eminent over all. This landmark they neither prescribe to
tbemselves, nor permit to be observed by others, when they
set up over themselves and others any masters rather than
Christ. There was a father" who contended that the Church
ODgfat not to take precedence of Christ, because his judg-
ment is always according to truth; but ecclesiastical judges,
liie other men, may generally be deceived. Breaking down
this landmark also, they scruple not to assert, that all the
authority of the Scripture depeods on the decision of the
Church, All the fathers, with one heart and voice, have
declared it execrable and detestable for the holy word of
God to be contaminated with the subtleties of sophists, and
perplexed by the wrangles of logicians. Do they confine
tiientaelves within these landmarks, when the whole business
of their lives is to involve the simplicity of the Scripture in
ndkss controversies, and worse than sophistical wrangles?
Mthat if the fathers were now restored to life, and heard
thii art of wrangling, which they call speculative divinity,
they would not suspect the dispute to have the least reference
to God. But if I would enumerate all the instances in which
tte authority of the fathers is insolently rejected by those
wlio would be thought their dutiful children, my address
would exceed all reasonable bounds. Months and years
would be insufficient for me. And yet such is their con-
lummate and incorrigible impudence, tliey dare to censure
us for presuming to transgress the ancient landmarks.
Kor can they gain any advantage against us by their
argument from custom; for, if we were compelled to submit
to custom, we should have to complain of the greatest in-
jasticc. Indeed, if the judgments of men were correct,
custom should be sought among the good. But the fact is
often very different. What appears to be practiced by many
soon obtains the force of a custom. And human affairs have
scarcely ever been in so good a state as for the majority to
be pleased witli things of real excellence. From the private
vices of multitudes, therefore, has arisen public error, or
^Auc. cap. a, Gontr. Cresc Cranunatii^
JOHW CALVW
rather a common agreement of vices, which these good men
would now have to be received as law. It ia evident to all
who can see, that the world is inundated with more than a
ocean of evils, that it is overrun with numerous destructive
peats, that every thing is fast verging to ruin, so that ^
must altogether despair of human affairs, or vigorously and
even violently oppose such immense evils. And the remedj^
is rejected for no other reason, but because we have beer
accustomed to the evils so long. But let public error be
tolerated in human society; in the kingdom of God nothisf
but his eternal truth should be heard and regarded, whicfc
no succession of years, no custom, no confederacy, can cif*
cumscribe. Thus Isaiah once taught the chosen people ot
God: " Say ye not. A confederacy, to all to whom this pet>-
pie shall say, A confederacy:" that is, that they should not
unite in the wicked consent of the people ; " nor fear ttaelf .
fear, nor be afraid," but rather " sanctify the Lord of ho&ts,''
that he might "be their fear and their dread,"" Noi^
therefore, let them, if they please, object against us past
ages and present examples; if we "sanctify the Lord of
hosts," we shall not be much afraid. For, whether man^
ages agree in similar impiety, he is mighty to take vtagtt*
ance on the third and fourth generation; or whether
the whole world combine in the same iniquity, he has given
an example of the fatal end of those who sin with a multt*'
tude, by destroying all men with a deluge, and prcservinj
Noah and his small family, in order that his individual faiA'
might condemn the whole world. Lastly, a corrupt custonV
is nothing but an epidemical pestilence, which is equalljn
fatal to its objects, though they fall with a multitude. ~
sides, they ought to consider a remark, somewhere made by
Cyprian," that persons who sin through ignorance, thou^
they cannot be wholly exculpated, may yet be considered ift
some degree excusable; but those who obstinately reject t'
truth offered by the Divine goodness, are without any excnstf
at alL
Nor are we so embarrassed by their dilemma as to t
obliged to confess, either that the Church was for som*
"T.ainti Ti(i. 1,, 13.
3, lib. a, et in EpiiL id. JnlUa. do Haent. ba|iti&
TO THE INSTITUTES 43
time extinct, or that we have now a controversy with
file Church. The Church of Christ has h'ved. and will
Mntinue to live, as long as Christ shall reign at the right
hand of the Father, by whose hand she is sustained, by
vffiose protection she is defended, by whose power she
is preserved in safety. For he will undoubtedly per-
form what he once promised, to be with his people " even
to the end of the world."" We have no quarrel against
tiie Church, for with one consent we unite with all
Ihe company of the faithful in worshipping and adoring
the one God and Christ the Lord, as he has been adored
iy all the pious in all ages, But our opponents deviate
widely from the truth when they acknowledge no Church
but what is visible to the corporeal eye, and endeavour to
eircumscribe it by those limits within which it is far from
iring included. Our controversy turns on the two following
points:^ — 6rst, they contend that the form of the Church is
always apparent and visible; secondly, they place that form
in ihe see of the Roman Church and her order of prelates.
We assert, on the contrary, first, that the Church may exist
Wifliout any visible form ; secondly, that its form is not con-
tsined in that external splendour which they foolishly
ximire, but is distinguished by a very different criterion, vie,
tile pure preaching of God's word, and the legitimate admin-
Mtration of the sacraments. They are not satisfied unless the
Ghurch can always be pointed out with the 6nger. But how
"ften among the Jewish people was it so disorganized, as to
"9vt no visible form left? What splendid form do we sup-
Pose could be seen, when Elias deplored his being left
•lotie?" How long, after the coming of Christ, did it remain
'^•thout any external form? How often, since that time,
"3Ve wars, seditions, and heresies, oppressed and totally
obscured it? H they had lived at that period, would they
''ave believed that any Church existed ? Yet Elias was in-
formed that there were " left seven thousand" who had " not
"^^ved the knee to Baal." Nor should we entertain any
"pubt of Christ's having always reigned on earth ever since
^is ascension to heaven. But if the pious at such periods
■^ad sought for any form evident to their senses, must not
nMalt. xxriii. 20. "< i Kuiss nx. 14, iS.
44 JOHN CALVIN
lh«ir hearts have been quite discouraged? Indeed it was-
alrcady considered by Hilary in his day as a grievous error.
that people were absorbed in foolish admiration of the
episcopal dignity, and did not perceive the dreadful mischief)
concealed under that disguise. For this is his language:'
" One thing I advi=e you — beware of Antichrist, for you
have an improper attachment to walls; your veneration for
the Church of God is misplaced on houses and buildings;
you wrongly introduce under them the name of peace. Is
there any doubt that they will be seats of Antichrist? I
think monntains, woods, and lakes, prisons and whirlpools,
less dangerous; for these were the scenes of retirement or
banishment in which the prophets prophesied" But what
excites the veneration of the multitude in the present d^
for their homed bishops, but the supposition that those a
tho holy prelates of religion whom they see presiding o
great cities? Away, (hen. with socb stnpid admiration.
OS rather leave it to the Lord, since be alone " knoweifa t'
that arc his,"* sometimes to remove from htnnan observatii
all external knowledge of bis Chorcfa. I admit this to I
dnadM jadgment of God on tbe earth; but if it be d
by ifae onpiety of men, why do we attempt to resist I
righteoiis veogeance of God? Tbus tbe Lord (
tRgratitnde of men in former ages; for, c
their rcdstance to his truth, and extinction of the I
bad pna tbon. be permitted them to be blinded by 3
Moded br abextrd faheboods, and immcrged la profo
dukness, so that there was do appearance of tbe <
Cfanrdi left: Jtt, at tbe same tinM, in tbe midst of d
and cTTOcs, be p rea em ed his scattered and concealed f
Nor is this to be i
Bw to save !■ all the confosioa of Bahykia, m
Ae fiei7 fsraaoe. Bst hov ja a g g am it it
Ae bxm of iKe Cbmrdi bf I knov boc wkat
at bscc lest I sbooU ftctma t
ttm^A. Tbe Ptop^ Aey saj.
pc^vMcd tB^^ a
TO THE INSTITUTES
45
sent tJie Church, and ought to be considered as the
rh. Therefore they cannot err. How is this? — Because
tiityare pastors of the Church, and consecrated to the Lord.
Aad did not the pastoral character belong to Aaron, and
the other rulers of Israel? Yet Aaron and his sons, after
their designation to the priesthood, fell into error when they
made the golden calf." According to this mode of reason-
inf, why should not the four hundred prophets, who lied to
Ahab, have represented the Church?" But the Church re-
Biined on the side of Micaiah, solitary and despised as he
was, and out of his mouth proceeded the truth. Did not
those prophets exhibit both the name and appearance of the
Qinrch, who with united violence rose up against Jeremiah,
•tnd threatened and boasted, " the law shall not perish from
the priest, nor counsel from the wise, nor the word from
tile prophet?"* Jeremiah is sent singly against the whole
mtUtitude of prophets, with a denunciation from the Lord,
that the " law shall perish from the priest, counsel from the
■wise, and the word from the prophet" " And was there not
tiie like external respectability in the council convened by the
diief priests, scribes, and Pharisees, to consult about putting
Christ to death ?" Now, let them go and adhere to the ex-
ternal appearance, and thereby make Christ and all the
prophets schismatics, and, on the other hand, make the
ministers of Satan instruments of the Holy Spirit. But if
Aey speak their real sentiments, let them answer me sin-
cerely, what nation or place they consider as the seat of the
Church, from the time when, by a decree of the council of
Basil, Eugenius was deposed and degraded from the pontifi-
cate, and Amadeus substituted in his place. They cannot
deny that the council, as far as relates to external forms, was
a lawful one, and summoned not only by one pope, but by
tvpo. There Eugenius was pronounced guilty of schism,
rebellion, and obstinacy, together with all the host of cardi-
nals and bishops who had joined him in attempting a disso-
lution of the council. Yet afterwards, assisted by the favour
of princes, he regained the quiet possession of his former
dignity. That election of Amadeus, though formally made
Sjer,
46
JOHN CALVm
^
by the adthority of a general and holy synod, vanished intt
smoke ; and he was appeased with a cardinal's hat, like a barfc*
ing dog with a raorsel. From the bosom of those heretics
and rebels have proceeded all the popes, cardinals, bishops,
abbots, and priests ever since. Here they must stop. Fot
to which parly will they give the title of the Church? Will
they deny that this was a general council, which wanted
nothing lo complete its external majesty, being tolemnlif
convened by two papal bulls, consecrated by a prcBidinC
legate of the Roman see, and well regulated in every point
of order, and invariably preserving the same dignity tc
last? Will they acknowledge Eugenius to be a schismatic
with all his adherents, by whom they have all been conse
crated? Either, therefore, let them give a different defiiii<
tion of the form of the Church, or, whatever be their t
her, we shall account them all schismatics, as having beaf
knowingly and voluntarily ordained by heretics. But if tt
had never been ascertained before, that the Church is
confined to external pomps they would themselves afford
as abundant proof of it, who have so long superciliously
exhibited themselves to the world under the title of I'
Church, though they were at the same time the deadb
plagues of it. I speak not of their morals, and those tragicw
exploits with which all their lives abound, since they profeME
themselves to be Phariaeea, who are to be heard and ntA
imitated. I refer to the very doctrine itself, on which th<4
found their claim to be considered as the Church, If yoB
devote a portion of your leisure. Sire, to the perusal of c
writings, you will clearly discover that doctrine to be a fat*
pestilence of souls, the firebrand, niin, and destruction at
the Church.
Finally, they betray great want of candour, by invidiously
repeating what great commotion?, tumults, and contentions
have attended the preaching of our doctrine, and what ef^ecU
it produces tn many persons. For it is unfair to charge 1
with those evils which ought to be attributed to the mallcC
of Satan. It is the native property of the Divine wont
never to make its appearance without disturbing Satan,
rousing his opposition. This is a most certain and unequivo-
cal criterion by which it is distinguished from false doctrine^
TO THE INSTITUTES 47
ily broached when they are heard with general
I received with applauses by the world. Thus,
-, when all things were immerged in profound
tc prince of this world amused and diverted
U the generalitj- of mankind, and, like another
:s, gave himself up to his ease and pleasures in
ce; for what would he do but amuse and divert
,1 the quiet and undisturbed possession of his
But when the light shining from above dis-
portion of his darkness — -when that Mighty One
and assaulted his kingdom — ^then he began to
f his wonted torpor, and to hurry on his armour.
iideed, he stirred up the power of men to suppress
lb by violence at its first appearance; and when this
I ineffectual, he had recourse to subtlety. He made
j^^H atabaptists, and other infamous characters, the instru-
^^^B tM of exciting dissensions and doctrinal controversies,
^^Hdfit view to obscure and finally to extinguish it And
^^^^^He continues to attack it both ways ; for he endeavours
^^^^Ht up this genuine seed by means of human force, and
^^^^H Ume time tries every effort to choke it with his tares,
^^^^H may not grow and produce fruit. But all his attempts
^^W^w vain, if we attend to the admonitions of the Lord,
who hath long ago made us acquainted with his devices,
that we might not be caught by him unawares, and has
anned us with sufficient means of defence against oil his
ilKtaalts. But to charge the word of God with the odium of
i seditions, excited against it by wicked and rebellious men, or
of sects raised by imposters,— is not this extreme malignity?
Vet it is not without example in former times. EHas was
asked whether it was not he " that troubled Israel."" Christ
I was represented by the Jews as guilty of sedition." The
apostles were accused of stirring up popular commotions."
Wherein does thi? differ from the conduct of those who,
at the present day, impute to us all the disturbances,
tumults, and contentions, that break out against us? But
tlie proper answer to such accusations has been taught us by
Elias, that the dissemination of errors and the raising of
tumults is not chargeable on us. but on those who are resist-
^^^^^ Elnp xnji. 17. "Luke ixiii. 1, j. "Acls xvii. 6, ladr. S.
JOHN CALVIK
ing the power of God. But as this one reply is sufficient
to repress their temerity, so. on the other hand, we must
meet the weakness of some persons, who are frequently dis-
turbed with such offences, and become unsettled and waver-
ing in their minds. Now, that they may not stumble and
fall amidst this agitation and perplexity, let them know that,
the apostles in their day experienced the same things that
now befall us. There were " unlearned and unstable " men,.
Peter says, who " wrested " the inspired writings of Paul'
" to their own destruction."" There were despisers of God,
who, when they heard that " where sin abounded grace did
much more abound," immediately concluded, Let us " con-
tinue in sin, that grace may abound." When they heard that
the faithful were "not under the law," they immediately
croaked, "^e will sin, because we are not under the law,
but under grace."" There were some who accused hii
an encourager of sin. Many false apostles crept it
destroy the churches he had raised. " Some preached " the
gospel "of envy and strife, not in sincerity." maliciously
"supposing to add affliction to his bonds."" In some placet
the Gospel was attended with little benefit. " All wert;
seeking their own, not the things of Jesus Christ."" Otherl
returned " like dogs to their vomit, and like swine to thcil
wallowing in the mire."" Many perverted the liberty of tlH
spirit into the licentiousness of the flesh. Many insinuatcil
themselves as brethren, who afterwards brought the pioui
into dangers. Various contentions were excited among t
brethren themselves. What was to be done by the apostle!
in such circumstances? Should they not have dissembled
for a time, or rather have rejected and deserted that Gospel
which appeared to be the nursery of so many disputes, the
cause of so many dangers, the occasion of so many offences?
But in such difficulties as these, their minds were relieved
by this reflection that Christ is the "stone of stumbling a
rock of offence."" " set for the fall and rising again oi
many, and for a sign which shall be spoken against;""^
and armed with this confidence, they proceeded boldly
through all the dangers of tumults and offences. The s
aPct. U
1 PebiLS.
Phi!. 1. 15, ,_
"Luke ii. M>
TO THE INSTITUTES
consideration shotdd support us, since Paul declares it to
be tht perpetual character of the Gospel, that it is a
"savour gf death unto death in them that perish,'"* although
It -^was rather given us to be the "savour of life unto life,"
and " the power of God to " the " salvation " of the faith-
ful ;" which we also should certainly experience it to be,
if v/e did not corrupt this eminent gift of God by our ingrat-
itude, and prevert to our destruction what ought to be a
principal instrument of our salvation.
But I return to you. Sire. Let not your Majesty be at
all moved by those groundless accusations with which our
adversaries endeavour to terrify you; as that the sole ten-
dency and design of this new Gospe! — for so they call it —
is to furnish a pretext for seditions, and to gain impunity
foy all crimes. "For God is not the author of confusion,
but of peace;"" nor is "the Son of God," who came to
" destroy the works of the devil, the minister of sin."** And
it is unjust to charge us with such motives and designs, of
^^rfaich we have never given cause for the least suspicion.
Is it probable that we are meditating the subversion of
kingdoms? — we, who were never heard to utter a factious
word, whose lives were ever known to be peaceable and
honest while we lived under your government, and who,
even now in our exile, cease not to pray for all prosperity
to attend yourself and your kingdom ! Is it probable that we
are seeking an unlimited license to commit crimes with
impunity? in whose conduct, though many things may be
blamed, yet there is nothing worthy of such severe re-
proach t Nor have we, by Divine Grace, profited so little in
Ine Gospel, but that our life may be an example to our
*^*lraclors of chastity, liberality, mercy, temperance, pa-
tience, modesty, and every other virtue. It is an undeniable
^act, that we sincerely fear and worship God, whose name
We desire to be sanctified both by our life and by our death;
and envy itself is constrained to bear testimony to the in-
nocence and civil integrity of some of us, who have suffered
the punishment of death for that very thing which ought to
be accounted their highest praise. But if the Gospel be
» Cor. u. ts, te.
. C«L IL 17.
JOHN CALVIK
a. pretcKt for tumults, which has not yet happened In
your kingdom; if any persons tnake the liberty of divine
grace an excuse for the licentiousness of their vices, of
whom I have known many, — there are laws and legal
penalties, by which they may be punished according to
their deserts; only let not the Gospel of God be reproached
for the crimes of wicked men. You have now, Sire, the
virulent iniquity of our calumniators laid before you in a
sufficient number of instances, that you may not receive their
ftteuaations with too credulous an ear. — I fear I have gone
too much into the detail, as this preface already approaches
the size of a full apology; whereas I intended it not to
contain our defence, hut only to prepare your mind to attend
to the pleading of our cause; for, though you are now
averse and alienated from us, and even inflamed against us,
we despair not of regaining your favour, if you will only
once read with calmness and composure this our confession,
which we intend as our defence before your Majesty. But,
on the contrary, if your ears are so preoccupied with the
whispers of the malevolent, as to leave no opportunity for
the accused to speak for themselves, and if those outrageous
iaries, with your connivance, continue to persecute with im-
prisonments, scourges, tortures, confiscations, and flames,
*e shall indeed, like sheep destined tfi the slaughter, be re-
duced to the greatest extremities. Yet shall we in patience
possess our souls, and wait for the mighty hand of the
Lord, which undoubtedly will in lime appear, and show it-
self armed for the deliverance of the poor from their afflic-
tion, and for the punishment of their despisers, who now
ftjcult In such perfect security. May the Lord, the King of
kings, establish your throne with righteousness, and your
kingdom wilh equity.
Sasii, lit Avgust. 1S36.
GENERAL SYLLABUS
The design of the Author in these Christian Institutes
is twofold, relating. First to the knowledge of God, as
the way to attain a blessed immortality; and, in connection
TO THE INSTITUTES 51
1 and subservience to this. Secondly, to the knowledge
of ourselves.
In the prosecution of this design, lie strictly follows the
method of the Apostles' Creed, as being most familiar to
all Christians. For as the Creed consists of four parts, the
first relating to God the Father, the second to the Son, the
third to the Holy Spirit, the fourth to the Church; so
the Author distributes the whole of this work into Four
Books, corresponding respectively to the four parts of
the Creed; as will clearly appear from the following
detail :—
I. The first article of the Creed relates to God the
Father, and to the creation, conservation, and government
of all things, which are included in his omnipotence.
So the first book is on the knowledge of God, considered
as the Creator, Preserver, and Governor of the universe at
large, and every thing contained in it. It shows both
the nature and tendency of the true knowledge of the
Creator— that this is not learned in the schools, but that
every man from his birth is self-taught it — Yet that the
depravity of men is so great as to corrupt and extinguieli
this knowledge, partly by ignorance, partly by wickedness;
60 that it neither leads him to glorify God as he ought, nor
conducts him to the attainment of happiness — And though
diis internal knowledge is assisted by all the creatures
around, which serve as a mirror to display the Divine per-
fections, yet that man does not profit by it — Therefore, that
to those, whom it is God's will to bring to an intimate and
saving knowledge of himself, he gives his written word;
which introduces observations on the sacred Scripture —
That he has therein revealed himself; that not the Father
only, but the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, united, is the
Creator of heaven and earth; whom neither the knowledge
innate by nature, nor the very beautiful mirror displayed to
us in (he world, can, in consequence of our depravity, teach
lu to know so as to glorify him. This gives occasion for
treating of the revelation of God in the Scripture, of the
unity of the Divine Essence, and the trinity of Persons.- —
To prevent man from attributing to God the blame of his
own voluntary blindness, the Author shows the state of
52 JOHN CALVIN
man at his creation, and treats of the image of God, fi^e-
will, and the primative integrity of nature. — Having finished
the subject of creation, he proceeds to the conservation and
government of all things, concluding the first book with
a full discussion of the doctrine of divine providence,
II. But since man is fallen by sin from tlie state in
which be was created, it is necessary to come to Christ
Therefore it follows in the Creed, "And in Jesus Oirisl;
his only Son our Lord," &c.
So in the second book of the Institutes our Author treats
of the knowledge of God as the Redeemer in Christ ; and
having shown the fall of man, leads him to Christ the Media-
tor. Here he slates the doctrine of original sin— that man
possesses no inherent strength to enable him to deliver
himself from sin and the impending curse, but that, on the
contrary, nolliing can proceed from him, antecedently to
reconciliation and renovation, but what is deserving of con-
demnation — Therefore, that, man being utterly lost in him-
self, and incapable of conceiving even a good thought by
which he may restore himself, or perform actions acceptable
to God, he must seek redemption out of himself, in Christ —
That the Law was given for this purpose, not to confine its
observers to itself, but to conduct them to Christ; which
gives occasion to introduce an exposition of the Moral Law
— That he was known, as the Author of salvation, to the
Jews under the Law, but more fully under the Gospel, in
which he is manifested to the world. — Hence follows the
doctrine of the similiarity and difference of the Old
New Testament, of the Law and Gospel. — It is next stated,
that, in order to the complete accomplishment of salva-
tion, it was necessary for the eternal Son of God to become
man, and that he actually assumed a real human nature :-
it is also shown how these two natures constitute one per-
son — That the office of Christ, appointed for the acquisition
and application of complete salvation by his merit and
efficacy, is sacerdotal, regal, and prophetical. — Next follows
the manner in which Christ executed his office, or actually
performed the part of a Mediator, being an exposition of
the Articles respecting his death, resurrection, and ascen-
sion to heaven. — Lastly, the Author shows the truth and
TO THE INSTITUTES
propriety of affirming that Christ merited the grace of God
a.nd salvation for us.
HI. As long as Christ is separate from us, he profits us
nothing. Hence the necessity of our being ingrafted into
him, as branches into a vine. Therefore the doctrine con-
cerning Christ is followed, in the third part of the Creed, by
this clause, "I believe in the Holy Spirit," as being the
bond of union between us and Christ.
So in the third book our Author treats of the Holy Spirit,
wrho unites us to Christ — and consequently of faith, by which
vfc embrace Christ, with his twofold benefit, free righteous-
ness, which he imputes to us, and regeneration, which he com-
mences within us, by bestowing repentance upon us. — And
to show that we have not the least room to giory in such
faith as is unconnected with the pursuit of repentance, be-
fore proceeding to the full discussion of justification, he
treats at large of repentance and the continual exercise of
it, which Christ, apprehended by faith, produces in us by
bis Spirit. — He next fully discusses the first and chief bene-
fit ot Christ when united to us by the Holy Spirit that is,
justification — and then treats of prayer, which resembles the
hand that actually receives those blessings to be enjoyed,
Which faith knows, from the word of promise, to be laid
up with God for our use.— But as all men are not united to
Christ, the sole Author of salvation, by the Holy Spirit, who
creates and preserves faith in us, he treats of God's eternal
election; which is the cause that we, in whom he foresaw no
6"o«d but what he intended freely to bestow, have been
fa.-vored with the gift ot Christ, and united to God by the
*^ectual call of the Gospel. — Lastly, he treats of complete
''^generation, and the fruition of happiness; that is, the
"J^al resurrection, towards which our eyes must be directed,
^»nce in this world the felicity of the pious, in respect of
*^'»joyraent, is only begun.
iV. But as the Holy Spirit does not unite all men to
CTlirist, or make them partakers of faith, and on those to
*w-liom he imparts it he does not ordinarily bestow it with-
'^Ut means, but employs for this purpose the preaching of
ttie Gospel and the use of the sacraments, with the admin-
istration of all discipline, therefore it follows in the Creed,
»
JOAN CALVm
"I beliere in d»e Holy Catlioyc Chorch," wdom, iltliongli
involved in eternal death, yet, in porsuMce of the grattiitoUt
election, God has freely reconciled to himself in Christ, and
made partakers of the Holy Spirit, that, being ingrafted ii
Christ, they may hare commimton with him as their he
whence flaws k perpettial remissioc of Bins, and a full
restoration to eternal life.
So in the fourth book our Author treats of the Chnrcb— •
then of the means used by the Holy SjMril io effectually call-
ing from spiritual death, and presetring the church — th*
word and sacraments — baptism and the Lord's supper—
which arc as it were Christ's rega! sceptre, by which hfc
ramimences hia spiritual reign in the Church by the energy
of his Spirit, and carries it forwards from day to day durii
the present life, after the close of which he perfects it wil
out those means.
And as political institutions are the asylums of the ChnrcK'
in this life, though civil government is distinct from tbA
spiritual kingdom of Christ, oi'r Author instructs us respect-^
ing it as a signal blessing of God, which the Church ought
to acknowledge with gratitude of heart, till we are called ottl
of this transitory state to the heavenly inheritance, wherfr
God will be all in all.
This is the plan of the Institutes, which may be cofiiprt
in the following brief summary: —
Man, created originally upright, being afterwards nrin
not partially, but totally, finds salvation out of himself, whdl^
in Oirist; to whom being united by the Holy Spirit, freely M
stowed, without any regard of future works, he enjoys i
him a twofold benefit, the perfect imputation of TighteotU
ness, which attends him to the grave, and the commencem
of sanctification, which he daily increases, till at length I
completes il at the day of regeneration or resurrection <
the body, so that in eternal life and the heavenly inheritanogj
bis praises are celebrated for such stupendous mercy.
INDICATION OF THE REVOLUTIONS
OF THE HEAVENLY BODIES
^^ BY NICOLAUS COPERNICUS (15+3)
^H TO POPE PAUL III
^^H' Can easily conceive, most Holy Father, that as soon
^^B| >.s some people learn that in this book which I have
^2^ written concerning the revolutions of the heavenly
^^Bodies, I ascribe certain motions to the Earth, they will cry
out at once that I and my theory should be rejected For I
am not so much in love with my conclusions as not to weigh
what others will think about them, and although I know
tfiat lie meditations of a philosopher are far removed from
Hie judgment of the laity, because his endeavor is to seek out
ihe truth in all things, so far as this is permitted by God
to the human reason, I still believe that one must avoid
tiieories altogether foreign to orthodoxy. Accordingly,
when I considered in my own mind how absurd a perform-
ance it must seem to those who know that the judgment of
many centuries has approved the view that the Earth re-
mains fixed as center in the midst of the heavens, if I should,
on the contrary, assert that the Earth moves; I was for a
long time at a loss to know whether I should publish the
commentaries which I have written in proof of its rnotion,
Nieolans Copemicua was born in 1473 at Thorn in Wert Prussia, of >
Polish failifr and a German mother. He ittcndcd ihe univerbily of Cracow
Tbc book tthic
itHitvtdby ill t,
'raaenhurB, and
rt of hisltfela
d by CopMi
] for K^ler, Galileo
a eslablish the Ibeoij i
CX)PEHNnCCS
or wbctiKT h were not better u> foQow tlie eximple of d
P3rthagorean5 and of some others, who were accustomed tO
transmit the secrets of Philosoplqr not in writing but oraHj^
and only to tbetr reUtires and friends, as ttie letter front
Lysis to Hipparcbos bears witness, Tbey did this, it s
to me, not as some think, becaose of a certaia sel&sfa rcluo-,
tance to give thdr ticws to tbe world, but in order that th«
noblest truths, worked oat by tlie careful study of ^rcat mei^
should not be despised by those who are vexed at die idea of
taking great pains with ai^ forms of literature except sucb
as would be proStable, or by those w1»o, if they are driven
to tbe study of Philosophy for its o«-n sake by the admoni-
tions and the example of others, nevertheless, on accoont of
their stupidity, hold a place among philosophers similar t
that of drones among bees. Therefore, when I considered
this carefully, the contempt which 1 had to fear becanse ol
the novelty and apparent absurdity of my view, nearly i
duced me lo abandon utterly the work I had begun.
My friends, however, in spite of long delay and even
resistance on my part, withheld me from this decision. Firs'
among these was Nicolaus Schonberg, Cardinal of Capua^
distinguished in all branches of learning. Next to him c<
my vety dear friend, Tidemann Giese, Bishop of Culm, «
moat earnest student, as he is, of sacred and, indeed, of a"
good learning. The latter has often urged me, at tim(
even spurring me on with reproaches, to publish and at la^
bring to the light the book which had lain in my study n
nine years merely, but already going on four times nint^
Not a few other very eminent and scholarly men made th«
same request, urging that I should no longer through feai
refuse to give out my work for the common benefit oi
students of Mathematics. They said I should find that t'
more absurd most men now thought this theory of minfl
concerning the motion of the Earth, the more admiration
and gratitude it would command after they saw in i*
publication of my commentaries the mist of absurdity
cleared away by most transparent proofs. So. infiuencet
by these advisors and this hope, I have at length allowei
my friends to publish the work, as they bad long besought
me to do.
DE REVOLUTIONTBUS
57
But perhaps Your Holiness will not so much wonder that
I hve ventured to publish these studies of mine, after
having taken such pains in elaborating them that I have not
liesiiaied to commit to writing my views of the motion of
iJie Earth, as you will be curious to hear how it occurred to
tM to venture, contrary to the accepted view of mathema-
ticians, and well-nigh contrary to common sense, to form a
conception of any terrestrial motion whatsoever. Therefore
I would not have it unknown to Your Holiness, that the
only thing which induced me to look for another way of
reckoning the movements of the heavenly bodies was that
I knew that mathematicians by no means agree in their
investigations thereof. For, in the first place, they are so
much in doubt concerning the motion of the sun and the
moon, that they can not even demonstrate and prove by
observation the constant length of a complete year; and in
the second place, in determining the motions both of these
md of the five other planets, they fail to employ consistently
one set of first principles and hypotheses, but use methods
of proof based only upon the apparent revolutions and
motions. For some employ concentric circles only ; others,
eccentric circles and epicycles; and even by these means
they do not completely attain the desired end. For, although
those who have depended upon concentric circles have shown
that certain diverse motions can be deduced from these, yet
they have not succeeded thereby in laying down any sure
Vtindpte, corresponding indisputably to the phenomena.
These, on the other hand, who have devised systems of
Wcentric circles, although they seem in great part to have
Kdved the apparent movements by calculations which by
these eccentrics are made to fit, have nevertheless intro-
duced many things which seem to contradict the first prin-
C^es of the uniformity of motion. Nor have they been able
to discover or calculate from these the main point, which
is the shape of the world and the fixed symmetry of its
parts; but their procedure has been as if someone were to
collect hands, feet, a head, and other members from various
places, all very fine in themselves, but not proportionate to
one body, and no single one corresponding in its turn to
ethttTs. so that a moDSter rather than a, man would be
SS OOPBRNIOtTS
formed froin them. Thus in their process of i
which they term a "method," they are found to have oi
something essential, or to have included something foM
and not pertaining to the matter in hand. This certa
would never have happened to them if tliey had follin
fixed principles ; for if the hypotheses they assumed were!
false, all that resulted therefrom would be verified iodl
tably. Those things which I am saying now may be obsci
yet they will be made clearer in their proper place. 1
Therefore, having turned over in my mind for a long i
this uncertainty of the traditional mathematical methods
calculating the motions of the celestial bodies, I begsa
grow disgusted that no more consistent scheme of the mi
ments of the mechanism of the universe, set up for i
benefit by that best and most law abiding Architect of
things, was agreed upon by philosophers who other wiew
vestigate so carefully the most minute details of this wffl
Wherefore I undertook the task of rereading the books o|
the philosophers I could get access to, to see whether any i
ever was of the opinion that the motions of the cele^
bodies were other than those postulated by the men H^
taught mathematics in the schools. And I found Q{
indeed, in Cicero, that Niceta perceived that the £d|
moved; and afterward in Plutarch I found that some oa
were of this opinion, whose words I have seen fit to qd
here, that they may be accessible to all : — ■ 1
" Some maintain that the Earth is stationary, hut Philol
the Pythagorean says that it revolves in a circle about
fire of the ecliplic, like the sun and moon. Heraklidei
Pontus and Ekphantus the Pythagorean make the El|
move, not changing its position, however, confined iai
falling and rising around its own center in the manner a|
wheel."
Taking this as a starting point, I began to consider j
mobility of the Earth; and although the idea seemed absd
yet because I knew that the liberty had been granted^
others before me to postulate all sorts of little circles |
explaining the phenomena of the stars, I thought I ^
might easily be permitted to try whether by postulating scjl
motion of the Earth, more reliable conclusions
DE REVOLUnONIBUS »
reached regarding the revolution of the heavenly bodies,
Ifia-n those of my predecessors.
And so, after postulating movements, which, farther on
in the book, I ascribe to the Earth, I have found by many
snd Jong observations that if the movements of the other
planets arc assumed for the circular motion of the Earth
»I»<J are substituted for the revolution of each star, not only
do their phenomena follow logically therefrom, but the
relative positions and magnitudes both of the stars and all
Iheir orbits, and of the heavens themselves, become so
closely related that in none of its parts can anything be
changed without causing confusion in the other parts and
in the whole universe. Therefore, in the course of the work
r have followed this plan; I describe in the first book all the
positions of the orbits together with the movements which
I ascribe to the Earth, in order that this bock might contain,
as it were, the general scheme of the universe. Thereafter
in. the remaining books, I set forth the motions of the other
stars and of all their orbits together with the movement of
the Earth, in order that one may see from this to what
ccxicnt the movements and appearances of the other stars and
Uteir orbits can be saved, if they are transferred to the move-
ment of the Earth. Nor do I doubt that ingenious and
learned mathematicians will sustain me, if they are willing
to recognize and weigh, not superficially, but with that
thoroughness which Philosophy demands above all things,
those matters which have been adduced by me in this work
to demonstrate these theories. In order, however, that both
the learned and the unlearned equally may see that I do
Dot avoid anyone's judgment, I have preferred to dedicate
these lucubrations of mine to Your Holiness rather than to
any other, because, even in this remote corner of the world
^vhere I live, you are considered to be the most eminent man
'Q dignity of rank and in love of all learning and even of
mathematics, so that by your authority and judgment you
can easily suppress the bites of slanderers, albeit the proverb
hath it that there is no remedy for the bite of a sycophant
If perchance there shall be idle talkers, who, though they
*re ignorant of all mathematical sciences, nevertheless as-
■uae the right to pass judgment on these things, and if they
60 COPERNICUS
should dare to criticise and attack this theory of mine be-
cause of some passage of scripture which they have falsely
distorted for their own purpose, I care not at all ; I will even
despise their judgmetit as foolish. For it is not unknown
that I^ctantius, oiherwise a famous writer but a poor mathe-
matician, speaks most childishly of the shape of the Earth
when he makes fun of those who said that the Earth has the
form of a sphere. It should not seem strange then to zealous
students, if some such people shall ridicule us also. Mathe-
matics are written for mathematicians, to whom, if my opin-
ion does not deceive me, our labors will seem to contribute
something to the ecclesiastical state whose chief office Your
Holiness now occupies; for when not so very long ago,
tinder Leo X, in the Lateran Council the question of revis-
ing the ecclesiastical calendar was discussed, it then remained
unsettled, simply because the length of the years and months,
and the motions of the sun and mor.n were held to have
been not yet sufficiently delermined. Since that time, I have
given my attention to observing these more accurately, urged
on by a very distinguished man, Paul, Bishop of Fossom-
brone, who at that time had charge of the matter. But what
I may have accomplished herein I leave to the judgment of
Your Holiness in particular, and to that of all other learned
mathematicians ; and lest I seem to Your Holiness to promise
I more regarding the usefulness of the work than I can per-
liorm, I now pass to the work itself.
PREFACE TO THE HISTORY
OF THE REFORMATION
IN SCOTLAND
BY JOHN KNOX (C. 1566)
To tile gentill readar, grace and peace from God the Father
of our Lord Jesus Christ, with the perpetuall cncreasc
of the Holy Sprcit.
IT is not uiiknowen, Christeane Reader, that the same
clud of ignorance, that long hath darkened many
rcalmes under this accurssed kingdome of that Romane
Antichrist, hath also owercovered this poore Realme; that
idolatrie hath bein manteined, the bloode of innocentis hath
bene sched, and Christ Jesus his eternall treuth hath bene
abhorred, detested, and blasphemed. But that same God
that caused light to schyne out of darknes, 10 the multitud
of his mercyes, hath of long tyme opened the eis of some
evJD within this Realme, to see the vanitie of that which then
was universally embrased for trew religioun ; and hes gevin
imto them strenth to oppone' thame selfis unto the same: and
now, into these our last and moist* corrupt dayis, hath maid
bis treuth so to triumphe amonges us, that, in despyte of
Sathan, hipochrisye is disclosed, and the trew wyrshipping
of God is manifested to all the inhabitants of this realme
who eis Sathan blyndis not, eyther by thair fylthy lustes.
Jobfl RCOK (ijr
hiROTian, Ursa edu
grct^tiaat st Fran
lamed to Seollind
■S-.S/.),
e I«drr
:d It Glaagow" UoVvi
i
sitr: ■»
h KefoTi
e HII bis d<rath n
.0 ifie present day. His prefat
Scottish (pelUng, gives loms indicai
lenee, of bit lempei . .. ~
, ihrough vhich his
: in the origioiil
rds the Roman Church.
Oppose. ■ Most.
JOHN KNOX
or eQis hy ambttioun, and tnsadabte covetousness, '
mack tbem irpung to' the power of God working by t
worde.
And bec&us we ar not ignorant what diverse bruittis' w
dispersed oi os, the profeisoures of Jesus Christ wittitn tl
realnie. in the begj-iuij-ng of our interprise, ordaur w
tackin, that all our proceidingis should be committed to
register; as that ihei war, by such as then paynfullie travail
led boith by loiing and pen; and so was collected a j'lisl
volume, (as after will appeir.) conteanyng thingis i
ffome the fyftie-awght* ye:;r of God, till the arrival] of tl
Quenis Majestic' furth of France, with the which the Co
lectour and Writtar for that ijtoe was content, and ncv«
roynded' further to have travailled in that kynd of writtiii
But, after jnvocatioun of the name of God. and after co
sultatioun with some faythfull, whai was thought by than
expedient to advance Goddis glorie, and to edifie this p
generatioun, and the posteritie to come, it was conclude^
that faythfull rehersall, should be maid of such personagoi
. as God had maid instruiiientis of his glorie, by opponyof
of thame selfis to manifest abuses, superstitioun, and idoN
atrie; and albeit thare be no great nombcr, yet ar thei a
then the Colkctour wold liave looked for at the begynnynft
and thairfoir is the volume somewhat enlarged abuif hi
expectatioun : And yit, in tlie begynnyng, mon' we c
all the gentill Readaris, not to look' of us such ane HistOlJF
as shall expresge all thingis that have occurred within thf|
Realme, during the tyme of this terrible conflict that KM
bene betuix the sanctes" of God and these bloody i
who dame to thame selves the titill of clargie, and to b
authoritie ower the saules of men; for, with the Pollicey/
mynd we to meddill no further then it hath ReligioUl
mixed with it. And thairfoir albeit that many thingv
which wer don be omitted, yit, yf we invent no leys," V
think our selves hlamless in that behalf. Of one oft*
(diing) we mon' foirwarne the discreat Readaris, which il
that thei be not ofEended that the sempill treuth be spokl
■Heain. •Emnors. "7. e., IJS8.
•Mary, Qa»eii of Scots, arrived in Seolland, Aiis. 19, tjei.
•iDlendcd. • Must. • Expecc " Saints.
*lCiiFil or Slate politics. "lies.
To THE HISTORY OF THE REPOEMATIOH 63
without partialitie ; for seing that of men we neyther hunt
lor reward, nor yitt for vane glorie, we lilill pass by the ap-
{irobadoun of such as seldome judge weill of God and of
Ub workis, Lett not tiiairfoar the Readir wonder, albeit
that our s^Ie vary and speik diverslie of men. according
as thei have declared tharaeselves sometymes ennemymes and
eometymes freindis, sometymes fervent, sometymes cold,
sometymes constant, and sometymes changeable in the cause
of God and of his holy religioun: for, in this our simplicitie,
•n suppoise that the Godlie shall espy our purpose, which
is, that God may be praised for his mercy Kirhawin," this
present age may be admonished to be thankfull for Goddis
benefittis offcrred, and the posferilie to cum may be in-
structed how wonderouslie hath the liglit of Christ Jesus
prevailled against darlcness in this last and most corrupted
A LETTER OF THE ADTHOaS
EXPOUNDING HIS WHOLE INTENTION I
COUKSE OF THIS WORKE: WHICH FOR THAT IT
CilVETH GREAT LIGHT TO THE HEADER, FCW TH8
BETTER UNDERSTANDING IS HEREUNTO ANNEXED
To the Right Noble, and Valorous, Sir Walter Rati
Knight, Lord Wardein of the Stanneryes, and 1
Majesties Liefetenaiint of the County of Comewa^n
SIR, knowing how doubtfully all allegories may be ^
strued, and this booke of mine, which I havef
tituled the Faery Queene, being a continued allefl
or darke conceit, I have thought good, as well for avo^
of gealous opinions and misconstnictions, as also for 3
better hght in reading thereof, (being so by you C!
manded,) to discover unto you the general intention.;
meaning, which in the whole course thereof I have fl
ioned, without expressing of any particular purpose!
by accidents therein occasioned. The generall end t'
fore of all the booke is to fashion a gentler
ind Spmaer ina born (n LonJon about
publisherf in T;po, i
\xr b«d planned
«0 THE FAERIE QUEEN
per9on in vcrtuous and gentle discipline : which for that
I conceived shoulde be most plausible and pleasing, being
coloured with an historical! fiction, the which the most
part of men delight to read, rather for variety of matter
then for profite of die ensample, I chose the historye of
King Arthure, as most fitte for the excellency of his per-
son, being made famous by many mens former workes,
and also furthest from the daunger of envy, and suspition
of present time. In which I have followed all the antique
poets historical! : first Homere, who in the persons of
Agamemnon and Ulysses bath ensampled a g^od governour
and a vertuous man, the one in his Ilias, the other in his
Odysseis; then Virgil, whose like intention was to doe in
the person of ^neas; after him Ariosto comprised lliem
both in his Orlando; and lately Tasso dissevered them
againe, and formed both parts in two persons, namely that
part which they in philosophy call Ethice, or \-ertues of a
private man, coloured ia his Rinaido; the other named
Pnlitice in his Godfredo, By cnsampie of which excellente
poets, I labour to pourtraict in Arthure, before he was king,
the image of a brave laiight, perfected in the twelve private
morall vertues, as Aristotle hath devised, the which is the
purpose of these first twelve bookes : which if I tinde to
be wtll accepted, 1 may be perhaps encoraged to frame the
other part of polliticke vertues in his person, after that hce
«me to be king. To some, I know, tliis methodc will
teeme displeasaunt, which had rather have good discipline
ifclivered plainly in way of precepts, or sermoned at large,
19 they use, then thus clowdily enwrapped in allegoricall
devises. But such, me seeme, should be satisfide with the
use of these dayes, seeing all things accounted by their
'howes, and nothing esteemed of, that is not delightful!
aid pleasing to commune sence. For this cause is Xenophon
preferred before Plato, for that the one, in the exquisite
<leplh of his judgement, formed a commune welth such as
it should he, but the other in the person of Cyrus and
tlie Persians fashioned a govemeraent, such as might best
^: so much more profitable and gratious is doctrine by
ttaample, then by rule. So have I laboured to doe in the
person o£ Arthure: whoma I conceive, after liia long edu-
t3) HC— Vol.89
EDMUND SPENSER
I
I
cation by Timon, to whom he was by Merlin deli
to be brought up, so soone as he was borne of the LsiJ)'
Igrayne, to have scene in a dream or vision tlie Faeiy
Queen, with whose excellent beauty ravished, he awaldnj
resolved to seeke her out, and so being by Merlin ann«
and by Timon thoroughly instructed, he went to seeke i
forth in Faeryc Land. In that Faery Queene I mea
glory in my general! intention, but in my particular 1
the most excellent and glorious person of i
the Queene, and her kingdome in Faery Laii£
And yel, in some places els, I doc otherwise shadow heEi'
For considering she beareth two persons, the one of ^
most royall queene or empresse, the other of a most \
tuous and beautiful lady, this latter part in some place
doe expresse in Belphoebe, fashioning her name accordin|
your owne excellent conceipt of Cj-nthia, (Phsebe an
Cynthia being both names of Diana.) So in the perso
of Prince Arthure I sette forth magnificence in particuIUi
which vertue, for that (according to Aristotle and t
rest) it is the perfection of all the rest, and cont^netl
in it them all, therefore in the whole course I mention ll
deedes of Arthure applyable to that vertue which I i
of in that booke. But of the xii. other vertues I ]
xii. other knights the patrones. for the more varied a
the history: of which these three bookes contayn thm>
The first of the ICnight of the Redcrosse, in whome 1
expresse holynes: The seconde of Sir Guyon, i
I sette forth temperaunce. The third of Britomartis, »
lady knight, in whome I picture chastity. But because
the beginning of the whole worke seemeth abrupte s
as depending upon other antecedents, it needs that ye k
the occasion of these three knights several! adventure
For the methode of a poet historical is not such as of a
historiographer. For an historiographer discourseth of *'
fayres orderly as they were donne, accounting as well tB
times as the actions; but a poet thrusteth into the midde*
even where it most concerneth him, and there recourai*'
to the things forepaste, and divining of thinges to t
maketh a pleasing analysis of all.
The beginning therefore of my history, if it were to 1
TO THE FAERIB QUEEN
told by an hiBtoriographer, should be the twelfth booke,
irWch Is the last; where I devise that the Faery Queene
fept her annual) feaste xii. dayes, uppon which xii. ecv-
wall dayts, the occasions of the xii. several adventure*
iapned, which being undertaken by xii. severall knights,
8K in these xii. books severally handled and discoursed.
Tht first was this. In the beginning of the feast, ther^
presented him selfe a tall clownish younge man, who, fall-
ing before the Queen of Faries, desired a boone (as tht
Mnner then was) which during that feast she might not
ffuse: which was that hee might have the atchievement
of any adventure, which during that feaste should happen:
Uiat being graunted, he rested him on the floore, unfitt*
through his rusticity for a better place. Soone after en*
f^ed a faire ladye in mourning weedes, riding on a whit*
Vise, with a dwarte behind her leading a warlike steed,
Oiat bore the armes of a knight, and his speare in thk
^warfcs hand. Shee, falling before the Queene of Faer-
ies, complayned that her father and mother, an ancient
king and queene, had bene by an huge dragon many years
&hut Up in a brasen castle, who thence suffred them not
to yssEW: and therefore besought the Faery Queene to
assygnt her some one of her knights to take on him Aat
exptoyt. Presently that clownish person, upstarting, dv
■ired that adventure: whereat the Queene much wonder^
ing, and the lady much gainesaying, yet he earnestly itii'
portuned his desire. In the end the lady told him, that
unlcsse that armour which she brought would serve him
(that is, the armour of a Christian man specified by Saint
Paul, vi. Ephes.), that he could not succeed in that enter-
prise: Which being forthwith put upon him with dewe furni-
tures thereunto, he seemed the goodliest man in al that
company, and was well liked of the lady. And eftesoonea
taking on him knighthood, and mounting on that straunge
courser, he went forth with her on that adventure: where
tKginneth the first booke vz,
A ffentle knight wai priddnf on the pU;De, &C.
The second day ther came in a palmer bearing an infant
with bloody hands, whose parents he complained to have
BDMUND SPENSER
bene slaya hy an enchauoteresse called Acrasia: and tbet
fore craved of the Faery Queene, to appoint him somi
knight to performe that adventure; which being assigned
to Sir Guyon, he presently went forth with that
palmer: which is the beginning of the second booke i
the whoJe subject thereof. The third day there came
a. groomc, who complained before the Faery Queene, 1
a vile enchaunter, called Busirane, bad in band a most
faire lady, called Amoretta, whom he kept in most srievoiM
torment, because she would not yield him the pleasur^
of her body. Whereupon Sir Scudamour, the
of that lady, presently tooke on him that adventure
But being unable to performe it by reason of the harj
enchaimtments, after long sorrow, in the end met w ' "
firitomartis, who succoured him, and reskewed his love.
But by occasion hereof, many other adventures are
terraedled. but rather as accidents then intendments: as t
love of Briioraart, the overthrow of Marinell, the miser]
of Florimell, the vertuousnes of Belphoebe, the lasciviousnd
of Hellenora, and many the like. [
Thus much, Sir, I have briefly overronne, to direct yoiJ
understanding to the wel-head of the history, that frta
thence gathering the whole intention of the conceit, ;
may, as in a handfull, gripe al the discourse, which othet
wise may happily secme tedious and confused. So humb^
craving the continuance of your honourable favour toward
me, and ih' eternall establishment of your happines, I humbi
take leave.
23. January, 1589. I
Yours most humbly a^ectionate,
Ed. Spenser.
^B PREFACE TO THE
P HISTORY OF THE WORLD
I BV SIR WALTER RALEIGH (161+)
HOW unfit and how unworthy a choice I have made
of myself, to undertake a work of this mixture,
mine own reason, though, exceeding weak, hath
SofiSdendy resolved me. For had it been begotten then with
my first dawn of day, when the Hglit of common knowledge
•>^gan to open itself to my younger years, and before any
^"'oimd received either from Fortune or Time, I might yet
"fell have doubted that the darkness of Age and Death would
have covered over both It and Me, long before the perform-
mcx. For, beginning with the Creation, I have proceeded
with the History of the World; and lastly purposed (some
te-w sallies excepted) to confine my discourse with this our
renowned Island of Great Britain. I confess that it had
better sorted with my disability, the better part of whose
times are run out in other travails, to have set together (as
I could) the unjointed and scattered frame of our English
affairs, than of the universal : in whom, had there been no
Mlier defect (who am ail defect) than the time of the day,
rt Were enough; the day of a tempestuous life, drawn on to
Il>e very evening ere I began. But those inmost and soul-
pisrcing wounds, which are ever aching while uncured ; vrith
the desire to satisfy those few friends, which I have tried by
lie fire of adversity, the former enforcing, the latter per-
the life of Ralagh win he fouad, g
prefixed to his "
travels." His "
SIR WALTER RALEIGH
suading; have caused me to make my thoughts legible, a
myself the subject of every opinion, wise or weak.
To the world I present them, to which 1 am nothing i
debted: neither have others thai were, (Fortune cbaogiog
sped much better in any age. For prosperity and adversil
have evermore tied and untied vulgar a£Eections. And i
wc see it ill experience, that dogs do always bark at t'
they know not, and that it js their nature to accompany a
another in those clamors: so it is with the inconsiderate mi
titude ; who wanting that virtue which we call honesty in i
men, and that especial gift of God which we call charity it
Christian men, condemn without hearing, and wound i ' '
out oiTence given: led thereunto by uncertain report on!;^
which his Majesty truly acknowledgeth for the author of iQ
lies. "Blame no man," saith Siracides, "before thou havC
inquired the matter: understand first, and then rcfon
righteously. 'Rumor, res sine teste, sine judice, maligna
fallax'; Rumor is without witness, without judge, roaliciott
and deceivable," This vanity of vulgar opinion it was, th
gave St. Augustine argument to affirm, tiiat he feared t
praise of good men, and detested that of the eviL Ai
herein no man hath given a better rule, than this of Seneca
"Conscienti^ satisfaciamus : nihil in famam laborema
Bequatur vcl mala, dura bene merearis." " Let us satisfy
own consciences, and not tronble ourselves with fame: bft
never so ill, it is to be despised so we deserve well."
For myself, it I have in anything served my Country, (
prized it before my private, the general acceptation can ylel
me no other profit at this time, than doth a fair sunshine d
to a sea-man after shipwreck; and the contrary no oth
harm, than an outrageous tempest after the port attained.
know that I lost the love of many, for my fidelity towan
Her,' whom I must still honor in the dust; though furtb
than the defence of her excellent person, I never persecutfli
»ny man. Of those that did it, and by what device they d
it He that is the Supreme Judge of all the world, hath tak<
the account: so as for this kind of suffering, I mtist i"
with Seneca, " Mala opinio, bene parU, delectat"'
I it He that i
^^H the account
An ill opiniuD, hoDorsbly BCquirei
TO THE HISTOET OF THK ■WORLD
Al for otber men; if there be any that have made thcm-
teive fathers of that fame which hath been begotten for
Hem, I can neither envy at such their purchased glory, nor
nnch lament mine own mishap in that kind; but content
injsclf to say with Virgil, "Sic vos non vobis,'" in many
psrticulars. To labor otlicr satisfaction, were an effect of
ktDzy, not of hope, seeing it is not trutli, but opinion, that
ao travel the world without a passport. For were it othcr-
wiie; and were there not as many internal forms of the
mind, as there arc externa! figures of men; there were then
wne possibility to persuade by the mouth of ne advocate,
I tren equity alone.
But such is tlic multiplying and extensive virtue of dead
earth, and of that breath-giving life which God hath cast
upon time and dust, as that among those that were, of whom
ft read and hear; and among those that are, whom we see
iliid converse with; everyone hath received a several picture
of face, and everyone a diverse picture of mind; everyone
■ form apart, everyone a fancy and cogitation differing:
there being nothing wherein Nature so much iriumpheth as
in dissimilitude. From whence it cometh that there is found
■0 {Treat diversi^ of opinions; so strong a contrariety of in-
dinationi; so many natural and unnatural; wise, foolish,
manly, and childish affections and passions tn mortal men.
For it is not the visible fashion and shape of plants, and of
Sable creatures, that makes the difference of working
one, and of condition in the other; bat (he form
d.
ftough it hath pleased God to reserve the art of
g men's thoughts to himself: yet, as the fruit tells the
name of the tree; so do the outvrard works of men (so far
as their cogitations are acted) give us whereof to guess at
the rest Nay. it were not hard to express the one by the
other, very near the life, did not craft in many, fear in the
most, and the world's love in all, teach every capacity,
according to the compass it hath, to qualify and make over
their inward deformities for a time. Though it be also true,
"Nemo potest diu personam ferre fictam: cito in naturam
suam residunt, quibus veritas non subest": "Ko man cau
■ " So jou [Mt to jrouicelvM."
72 SIR WALTER RAIAXOH
long cotitinue masked in a counterfeit behavior: the thin
that are forced for pretences having no ground of ti
cannot long dissemble their own natures." Neither can
man (saith Plutarch) so change himself, but that his i
may be sometimes seen at his tongue's end.
In this great discord and dissimilitude of
creatures, if we direct ourselves to the multitude; "or
honestK rei malus judex est vulgus" : " The common p
arc evil judges of honest things, and whose wisdom (
Ecclesiastes) is to be despised": if to the better sort, everj-
understanding hath a peculiar judgment, by wliich it I
censureth other men, and valueth itself. And therefore unta
me it will not seem strange, though I find these my worth-
less papers torn with rats: seeing the slothfid censurers
all ages have not spared to tax the Reverend Fathers of th
Church, with ambition; the severest men to themselves, witl
hypocrisy; the greatest lovers of justice, with populariqr;:
and those of the truest valor and fortitude, with vain-gloty.
But of these natures which lie in wait to find fault, and K
turn good into evil, seeing Solomon complained long since:
and that the very age of the world renders it every day
after other more malicious ; I must leave the professors to
their easy ways of reprehension, than which there is nothing,
of more facility.
To me it belongs in the first part of this Preface, follow*,
ing the common and approved custom of those who have
left the memories of time past to after ages, to give, as nea
as I can, the same right to history which they have done.
Yet seeing therein I should but borrow other men's vrotis,
I will not trouble the Reader with the repetition. True ft
is that among many other benefits for which it hath been
honored, in this one it triumpheth over all human knowledge^
that it hath given us life in our understanding, since the
world itself had life and beginning, even to this day: ycf^
it hath triumphed over time, which besides it nothing bitt
eternity hath triumphed over: for it hath carried our knowl'
edge over the vast and devouring space of many thousand*
of years, and given so fair and piercing eyes to our mind;
that we plainly behold living now (as if we had lived then)
that great world, " Magni Dei sapiens opus," " The wiM
TO THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD
work (saith Hermes) of a great God," as it was then, when
but new lo itself. By it (I say) it is, that we live in the
VC17 time when it was created : we behold how it was gov-
l;how it was covered with waters, and again repeopled;
how kings and kingdoms have flourished and fallen, and for
ind piety God made prosperous; and for what
vice and defonnity he made wretched, both the one and the
Other, And it is not the least debt which we owe unto his-
tory, that it hath made us acquainted with our dead an-
cestors : and, out of the depth and darkness of the earth,
delivered us their memory and fame. In a word, we may
gather out of history a policy no less wise than eternal; by
the comparison and application of other men's fore-passed
miseries with our own like errors and ill deservings. But it
is neither of examples the most hvcly instruction, nor the
words of the wisest men, nor the terror of future tor-
ments, that hath yet so wrought in our blind and stupified
minds, as to make us remember, that the infinite eye and
wisdom of God doth pierce through all our pretences; as to
make us remember, that the justice of God doth rctjuire none
other accuser than our own consciences: which neither the
false beauty of our apparent actions, nor all the formality,
which (to pacify the opinions of men) we put on, can in
any, or the least kind, cover from his knowledge. And so
much did that heathen wisdom confess, no way as yet quali-
^d by the knowledge of a true God. If any (saith Euripi-
•Jes) " having in his life committed wickedness, thinks he can
■"de it from the everlasting gods, he thinks not well."
To repeat God's judgments in particular, upon those of all
"fSTees, which have played with his mercies would require a.
•^Iiame apart: for the sea of examples hath no bottom. The
■"arks, set on private men, are with their bodies cast into the
'irth; and their fortunes, written only in the memories of
'"Ose that lived with them: so as they who succeed, and
"^-V-e not seen the fall of others, do not fear their own faults.
p*z»<3's judgments upon the greater and greatest have been
'^"^t to posterity; first, by those happy hands which the Holy
'^"«>st hath guided; and secondly, by their virtue, who have
S^trhered the acta and ends of men mighty and remarkable
*)^ the world. Now to point far oS, and to speak of the con-
i
STB WALTER RALKIGH
vmSen otaikgAs intodnils; for ambatioD: or of the grtftN
Mt aad Btaat gtorioos Idn^ wbo hare gnawn the grass oM
dw tardi witb beam for pride and ingntitwle towards God ^
or of that wi»e working of Ptoraoh, wtaen he slew the in"
ftats of Israel, ere they had recovered thdr cradles: or o^^
the policT of Jez«beL in eoTcr in g the murder of Nabolb b
s trial of the Elden, according to the Law, with many fboD^
Mods of the tike: what were it other, than to make an hope-
lea proof, that far-off examples would not be left to Omi
Mne far-olf respects, as heretofore? For wbo bath not:
ohscrvcd. what labnr, practice, peril, bloodshed, and cmdty, ,
At IciRgi and princes of the world have ondergone, Cxer-
dMd, taken on them, and comniitted; to make themselves'
aod Aeir issaes iiia=ters of the world? And jret hath Babjr-
lon, Persia, Sjria, Ikfacedon, Carthage, Rome, and the tes^ ,
no fnrit, no flower, grass, nor leaf, springing apon the face
ol die earth, of those seeds: no, their very roots and rUiBi'
do hardhr remain. " Omnia quae manu homir.um facta soit^
*il manu hominum evertnntor, rcl stando ct durando defi-
efiBt"; " ATI that the hand of man can make, is either over*
tamed by the hand of man, or at length l^ standing and
continuing ccosuroed," The reasons of whose rains, are
diTcrtely given by those that ground their opinions on s
end causes. AH kingdoms and states have fallen (say the
politicians) by outward and forei^ force, or by inward
n^ligence and dissension, or by a third cause arising from
both. Others observe, that the greatest have sunk down
nnder their own weight: of which Livy hath a touch: "
crevit. ut magnitudine laboret sua" :• Others, That the divine
providence fwhich Cratippus objected to Pompey) hath i
down the date and period of every estate, before their first
foundation and erection. But hereof I will give mj-aelf a
day over to resolve.
For seeing the first books of the following stofy, have
tmdertaken the discourse of the first kings and kingdoms;
and that it Is impossible for the short life of a Preface, to
travel after, and overtake far-off antiquity, and to judge of
I will, for the present, examine what profit hath been
gathered by our own Kings, and their neighbour princes : who
Ba lBcr«Mcd. «]th the r«>atc tint ke U opprcved b; hU crotai
^^H gathered
^^fe •-Ball
To THB HISTORY OP THB WORLD
7S
bi'risg behcM, both in divine and human letters, the succcsB
of infidelity, injustice, and cruelty; have (notwithstanding)
pJanted after the same pattern.
True ft is, that the judgments of all men arc not agreeable;
nor (which is more strange) the affection of any one man
stirred up alike with examples of like nature: but every one
is touched most, with that which most nearly seemeth to
touch his own private, or otherwise best suiteth with his
apprehension. But the judgmenis of God are forever un-
changeable: neither is He wearied by the long process of
dme, and won to give Hla blessing in one age, to that which
He hath cursed in another, Wherefor those that are wise,
or whose wisdom if it be not great, yet is true and well
grounded, will be able to discern the bitter fruits of ir-
rehgious policy, as well among those examples that are
found in ages removed far from the present, as in those of
latter times. And that it may no less appear by evident
proof, than by asseveration, that ill doing hath always been
attended with ill success; I will here, by way of preface,
tun over some examples, which the work ensuing hath not
fcached.
Among our kings of the Norman race, we Iiavc no sooner
passed over the violence of the Norman Conquest, than we
encounter with a singular and most remarkable example of
God's justice, upon the children of Henry the First For
that King, when both by force, craft, and cruelty, he had
dispossessed, overreached, and lastly made blind and
destroyed his elder brother Robert Duke of Normandy, to
make his own sons lords of this land: God cast them all,
male and female, nephews and nieces (Maud excepted) into
the bottom of the sea, with above a hundred and fifty others
that attended them; whereof a great many were noble and
of the King dearly beloved.
To pass over the rest, till we come to Edward the
Second; it is certain, that after the murder of that King,
the issue of blood then made, though it had some times of
stay and stopping, did again break out, and that so often and
in such abundance, as all our princes of the masculine race
(very few excepted) died of the same disease. And al-
though the young years of Edward the Third made his
SIR WALTES RALBKm
kaemieAge of that horrible £act ao iBcn 61211 m sp ido u tfy '
ya in thai he afterwards cattsed hU own tmde, tbe Earl of
Kent, to die, for no other offence tlua die desire of his
brother's redemption, whom the Eul as tfacn supposed to be
linag: the King tnakiog that to be ticaud in his tnnclev
which was indeed treason in htnudi, (had his node's mtel-
licence been true) this I saj made il manifest, that be waa
DOI ignorant of what had past, nor srcailj dotroos to have
bad it otbcTM-ise, though be caused Mortimer to die for tbe
MOM.
Thti cnielty the secret and tmseardtaUe judgment of Gc*d
revenged on the grandchild of Edward the Third: and so
it fell out, even to the last of that line, that in the second oC
Ibird descent tfaey were aO buried imder Hie ruins of tho^^
InUdincs, of which the tnortar had been tempered wi«J>
tasoecot blood. For Richard the Second, who saw bo*^
hi» Trcaturen, his Chancellor, and his Steward, with dire^^
•ffxri of bis counsellors, sotne of tbem slai^htered hj tf^*^
people, otben in hb absence executed by his enemies, j^^^
be ahr^i took himsdf for orer-wise to be taught by er^"
— pl<i. The Earls of Hontingdoo and Kent, Montagu aiK.''
tpttmr, who thonght tbemsdves as great politicians i:^
0me d^ at oiliers bave done in these: boping to plea&-'
0m KfalC- *"'' C* Mcttre tbemsdves, bj tbe mnnler o
CfaaecMcr; died loon after, with manr other their ;
%tnMM. Vj tbe like violent hands; and far more shamefi
Mm* f^ that dnkc. And as for the King fannself ( who ii
fOlgarrf of nanr deeds, onworthj of his greatness, cannot b _
Ml— 111. 8S tbe £sarowing bimsdf t^ breach of faith-^^^
^kmun, imrdoot, and patents) : be *»as in the prime of hi=t -*^
fmlk 4t90&td, and nnirdered bjr his consin-german an(==^
^timd, Bcarj ot Lancaster, afterward; Hcnr7 tbe Fourth. —
TMa Ki«C> wbo« title was weak, and his obtaining th^^f^
Cmm mftoroos; vbo brake faith with tbe lords at bi^^'
Ifliiiiflf; pfoteatfaif to intend onh- the 1 ec u v er y of bis piopeu^-
MkwfiUntt, Walcc fiuth with Richard himself; and 1
MA wM aO tte kvigdom in Parliansent. to whom he s
MMtdtetfcpMcdKiOff should lire. After that he had enjo]
iMe mUm tomt few years, and in that time had been
•pM aS fMn by faia nbiects, and ncrer free from caD-—
irO THE HISTORY OP THE WORLD
S^racies and rebellions: he saw (if souls immortal see and
discern anythings after the bodies' death) his grandchild
Henry the Sixth, and his son the Prince, suddenly and with-
out mercy, murdered; the possession of the Crown (for
which he had caused so much blood to be poured out)
transferred from his race, and by the issues of his enemies
worn and enjoyed: enemies, whom by his own practice he
supposed that he had left no less powerless, than the suc-
cession of the Kingdom questionless; by entailing the same
upon his own issues by Parliament. And out of doubt,
human reason could have judged no otherwise, but that
these cautious provisions of the father, seconded by the
valor and signal victories of his son Henry the Fifth, had
buried the hopes of every competitor, under the despair of
all reconquest and recovery. I say, that human reason
might so have judged, were not this passage of Casaubon also
true ; " Dies, hora, momentum, evertendis domination ib us suf-
' ficit, quae adamantinis credebantur radicibus esse fundatae:"
"A day, an hour, a moment, is enough to overturn the things,
that seemed to have been founded and rooted in adamant."
Now for Henry the Sixth, upon whom the great storm
of his grandfather's grievous faults fell, as it formerly
had done upon Richard the grandchild of Edward: al-
thoug:h he was generally esteemed for a gentle and innocent
prince, yet as he refused the daughter of Armagnac, of the
House of Navarre, the greatest of the Trinces of France,
to whom he was affianced (by which match he might have
defended his inheritance in France) and married the daugh-
ter of Anjou, (by which he lost all that he had in France)
So in condescending to the unworthy death of his uncle of
Gloucester, the main and strong pillar of the House of
I.ancaster; he drew on himself and this kingdom the great-
est joint-loss and dishonor, that ever it sustained since the
3^ornian Conquest. Of whom it may truly be said which
a counsellor of his own spake of Henry the Third of France •
"Qu'il estait une fort gentile Prince; mais son reignc est
advenu en une fort mauvais temps:" "He was a very
gentle Prince; but his reign happened in a very unfortunate
season."
It is true that Buckingham and Suffolk were the practicciB
fllR WALTER RALEIGH
ud CantriTCrs of the Duke's death : Buchinghani u»d SoffoHt
becauM tlie Duke gave instructions to their authority, which
otherwise under the Queen had beea absolute; the Quem
in respect of her personal wound, " spretaeque injuria for-
■M,"* because Gloucester dissuaded her marriage. But the
fruit was answerable to the seed ; the success to tha counsel
For after tlie cutting down of Gloucester, York grew up so
fast, as he dared to dispute his right both by argunacnts and
»rms; in which quarrel, Suffolk and Buckingham, with the
greatest number of their adherents, were dissolved. And
although for bis breach of oath by sacrament, it pleased
God to strike down York: yet his son the Earl of March,
following the plain path which his father had trodden out,
despoiled Henry the father, and Edward the son, both of
tiieir lives and kingdom. And what was the end now of
that politic lady the Queen, other than this, that she lived
to behold the wretched ends of all her partakers: that tbt
lived to look on, while her husband the King, and her only
son the Prince, were hewn in sunder; while the Crown
was set on his head that did it. She lived to see herself
despoiled of her estate, and of her moveables: and lastly,
her father, by rendering up to the Crown of France the
Earldom of Provence and other places, for the payment ol
fifty thousand crowns for her ransom, to become a staric
beggar. And this was the end of that subtility, which Si-
raeides calleth "fine" but "unrighteous:" for other fruit
faaih it never yielded since the world was.
And now it came to Edward the Fourth's ttini (though
after many difficulties) to triumph. For all the plants of
Lancaster were rooted up, one only Earl of Richmond ex-
cepted: whom also he had once bought of the Duke of
Brittany, but could not hold him. And yet was not this
of Edward such a plantation, as could any way promise it-
aelf Btobility, For this Edward th« King (to omit more
than many of his other cruelties) beheld and allowed ttiQ
slaughter which Gloucester, Dorset, Hastings, and others,
made of Edward the Prince in his own presence; of which
tiBgical actors, there was not one that escaped the judg-
nent of God in the same kind. And he, which (besides
• "Thsiuiilt done bi >c«n>iii| her fc w^ ."
TO THB HISTORT OF THE WORLD
theexKUtion of his brother Clarence, for nore other offence
ihan he hini&etf bad formed in his own imagination) in-
sinicted Gloucester to kill Henry the Sixth, his predeces-
»r; taught him also by the same an to kill his own sons and
successors, Edward and Richard. For those kings which
hive sold the blood of others at a low r^te; have but made
the market for iheir own enemies, to buy of theirs at the
same price.
To Edward the Fourth succeeded Richard the Third, the
greatest master in mischief of all that fore-went him; who
although, for the necessity of his tragedy, he had more
parts to play, and more to perform in his own person, than
all the rest ; yet he so well fitted every affection that played
with bim, as if each of them had but acted his own interest.
For he wrought so cunningly upon the aflfections of Hast-
ings and Buckingham, enemies to the Queen and to all
hcr kindred, as he easily allured them to condescend, that
Rivers and Grey, the King's maternal uncle and half
brother, should (for the first) be severed from him: sec-
ondly, he wrought their consent to have them imprisoned:
and lastly (for the avoiding of future inconvenience) to
have their heads severed from their bodies. And having
noiw brought those his chief instruments to exercise that
common precept which the Devil haih written on every
Post, namely, to depress those whom they had grieved, and
destroy those whom they had depressed ; he urged that argu-
'^•int 30 far and so forcibly, as nothing but the death of
tt»,£. young King himself, and of his brother, could fashion
*»^' conclusion. For he caused i[ to be hammered into
^ i^iickingham's head, that, whensoever the King or his
'* *~ mother should have able years to exercise their power,
*^^«y would take a most severe revenge of that cureless
^5^ *ong, offered to their uncle and brother. Rivers and
But this was not his manner of reasoning with Hastings,
^^^■hose fidelity to his master's sons was without suspect: and
^j^^t the Devil, who never dissuades by impossibility, taught
*^im to try him. And so he did. But when he found
■^y Catesby, who sounded him, that he was not fordable; he
"^LTSt resolved to kill him sitting in council: wherein having
SIR WALTER RALEIGH
failed with bis sword, he set the hangman apen him, wMt
a weapon of more weight. And because nothing else couid
move his appetite, he caused his head to be stricken off, Im-
fore he ate his dinner. A greater judgment of God than
this upon Hastings, I have never observed in any staiy.
For the selfsame day that the Earl Rivers, Grey, and others,
were (without trial of law, of offence given) by Hastings'
advice executed al Pomfret: I say Hastings himself in the
same day, and (as I lake it) in the same hour, in the same
lawless manner had his head stricken off in the Tower of
London, But Buckingham lived a while longer; and with
an eloquent oration persuaded the Londoners to elect Rich*
ard for their king. And having received the Earldom of
Hereford for reward, besides the high hope of marrying his
daughter to the King's only son; after many grievous vexa-
tions of mind, and unfortunate attempts, being in the end
betrayed and delivered up by his trustiest servant; he had
his head severed from his body at Salisbury, without ifte
trouble of any of his Peers. And what success had Richard
himself after all these mischiefs and murders, policies, and
counter-policies to Christian religion: and after such time as
with a most merciless hand he had pressed out the breath of
his nephews and natural lords ; other than the prosperity of
so short a life, as it took end, ere himself could well look
over and discern itp The great outcry of innocent blood,
obtained at God's hands the effusion of his; who became a
spectacle of shame and dishonor, both to his friends asd
enemies.
This cruel King, Henry the Seventh cut ofF; and
therein (no doubt) the immediate instrument of God's jii»-
tice. A politic Prince he was if ever there were any, who
by the engine of Iris wisdom, beat down and overturned as
many strong oppositions both before and after he wore the
Crown, as ever King of England did: I say by his wisdom,
because as he ever left the reins o£ his affections in the hands
of his profit, so he always weighed his undertakings by his
abilities, leaving nothing more to hazard than so much as
cannot be denied it in all human actions. He had well
observed the proceedings of Louis the Eleventh, whom he
followed in all that was royal or royal-like, but he was far
TO THE HISTOEY OF THE WOKLD
K Just, and begun not thoir processes whom he hated or
feared by the execution, as Louis did.
He could never endure any mediation in rewarding his
servants, and therein exceeding wise : for whatsoever him-
self gave, he himself received back the thanks and the love,
Icnowing it wcH that the affections of men (purchased by
nothing so readily as by benefits) were trains that better
became great kings, than great subjects. On the contrary,
in whatsoever he grieved his subjects, he wisely put it off
on those, that he found fit ministers for such actions. How-
soever the taking off of Stanley's head, who set the Crown
on his, and the death of the young Earl of Warwick, son
to George, Duke of Clarence, shows, as the success also
did, that he held somewhat of the errors of his ancestors;
foi his possession in the first line ended in his grand-
children, as that of Edward the Third and Henry the
Fourth had done.
Now for King Henry the Eighth; if all the pictures and
patterns of a merciless prince were lost in the world, they
might all again be painted to the life, out of the story of
this king. For how many servants did he advance in haste
(but for what virtue no_ man could suspect) and with the
change of his fancy ruined again; no man knowing for what
ofience? To how many others of more desert gave he abun-
dant flowers from whence to gather honey, and in the end
of harvest burnt them in the hive? How many wives did
he cut off, and cast off, as his fancy and affection changed?
How many princes of the blood (whereof some of them
forage could hardly crawl towards the block) with a world
of others of all degrees (of whom our common chronicles
have kept the account) did he execute? Yea, in his very
death-bed, and when he was at the point to have given his
account to God for the abundance of blood already spiU, he
itiprisoned the Duke of Norfolk the father; and executed
fte Earl of Surrey the son; the one, whose deservings he
luiew not how to value, having never omitted anything that
concerned his own honor, and the King's service; the other
never having committed anything worthy of his least dis-
pfewure: the one exceeding valiant and advised; the other
"> lew valiant than learned, and of excellent hope. But
I
tt SIR "WAI-TEII RALEIGH
besides the sorrows which he heaped upon the fatherlea
and widows at home: and besides the vain eaterprix
abroad, wherein it is thought that he consumed more treas^
ure ihan all our victorious kings did in their several £
quests: what causeless and cruel wars did he make upoH
his own nephew King James the First? What laws a
wills did he devise to cut off, and cut down those branches
which iprang from the same root that hiiiiscl£ did?
in the end (notwithstanding these his so many irreligioui
provisions) it pleased God to take away all his own, with-
out increase; though, for themselves in tiieir several kindly
all princes of eminent virtue. For these words of Samiui
to Agag King of the Amalekites, have been verified uiM
many others: " As thy sword hath made otlier women chiW*
less, so shall thy mother be childless among other womeiL^
And that blood which the same King Henry affirmed, thatth
cold air of Scotland had frozen up in the North, God hat
diffused by the sunshine of his grace: from whence hii
Majesty now living, and long to live, is descended,
whom I may say it truly, "That if all the malice of th'
world were infused into one eye; yet could it not discern ii
his hfe, even to this day, any one of these foul spots, lc_
which the consciences of all the forenamed princes {iM
effect) have been defiled; nor any drop of that innoce*
blood on the sword of his justice, wiih which the most tl
fore-went him have stained both tlieir bands and fames
And for this Crown of England ; it may truly be avowed
that he hath received it even from the hand of God, i
hath stayed the time of putting it on, howsoever he wef'
provoked to hasten it; that he never took revenge of att3
man, that sought to put him beside it: that he refused ti»'
assistance of Her enemies, that wore it long, with as gre»
glory as ever princess did: that his Majesty entered not ^
a. breach, nor by blood ; but by the ordinary gate, which fW
own right set open; and info which, by a general love a**
obedience, he was received. And howsoever his Majesty
preceding title to this Kingdom was preferred by ]
princes (witness the Treaty at Cambray in the year ISS9
yet he never pleased to dispute it, during the life of
renowned lady his predecessor; no, notwithstanding the iA
jury of not being declared heir, in all the time of her long
reign,
Neither ought we to forget, or neglect our thankfulness
to God for the uniting of the northern parts of Britain to
the south, to wit, of Scotland to England, which though they
re severed but by small brooks and barks, yet by reason
of the long continued war, and the cruelties exerciaed upon
each other, in the affections of the nationa, they were in-
finitely severed. This I aay is not the least of God's bless-
ii^^ which his Majesty hath brought with him unto this
land: no, put all our petty grievances together, and heap
them up to their height, they will appear but as a mole-
hill compared with the mountain of this concord. And if
all the historians since then have acknowledged the uniting
of the Red Rose, and the White, for the greatest happiness
(Christian Religion excepted), that ever this kingdom re-
ceived from God, certainly the peace between the two Hona
of gold and gules, and the making them one, doth by many
d^rees exceed the former; for by it, besides the sparing
of our British blood, heretofore and during the difference,
so often and abundantly shed, the state of England is more
assured, the kingdom more enabled to recover her ancient
honor and rights, and by it made more invincible, than by
all our former alliances, practices, policies, and conquests.
It ia true that hereof we do not yet find the effect. But had
Iha Duke of Parma in the year 1588, joined the army which
he commanded, with that of Spain, and landed it on the
south coast; and had his Majesty at the same time declared
hinuelt against us in the North: it is easy to divine what
^id become of the liberty of England, certainly we would
llisn without murmur have bought this union at far greater
price than it hath since cost us. It is true, that there was
Mser any common weal or kingdom in the world, wherein
no man had cause to lament. Kings live in the world, and
not above it. They are not infinite to examine every man's
isuie, or to relieve every man's wants. And yet in the
I'Her (though to his own prejudice), his Majesty hath had
"wre comparison of other men's necessities, than of his own
(offers. Of whom it may be said, as of Solomon,' " Dedit
'"Cm! gava to SolDmon largeneM at hurl."— i Slugs Iv, 19.
SIH WALTER RALEIGH
Deus Solomoni latitudinem cordis": Which if other fl
do not understand with Pineda, to be meant by Hberah "^y
but by " latitude of knowledge " ; yet may it be better spolc: -^^
of His Majesty, than of any king that ever England ha^ *^
who as well in divine, as human understanding, hath e-^^"
ceeded all that fore-went him. by many degrees.
I could say much more of the King's majesty, wilho '•**
flattery: did I not fear the imputation of presumption, a«-^»<l
withal suspect, that it might befall these papers of miKT^e
(though the loss were little) as it did the pictures of Qtie^^^"
Elizabeth, made by unskilful and common painters, whic^^'*
by her own commandment were knocked in pieces and ca .^s*
into the 6re. For ill artists, in setting out the beauty of ih^^^
external ; and weak writers, in describing the virtues o£ tt^^*
internal; do often leave to posterity, of well formed fac^^^
a deformed memory; and of the most perfect and princcl _J
minds, a most defective representation. It may suffice, an -" '
there needs no other discourse; if the honest reader hiM^
compare the cruel and turbulent passages of our forme '^|
kings, and of other their neighbor-princes (of whom fos^J
that purpose I have inserted this brief discourse) with hi^9
Majesty's temperate, revengeless and liberal disposition : E^
say, that if the honest reader weigh them justly, and witHW
an even hand; and withal but bestow every deformed chilcH^
on his true parent ; he shall find, that there is no man tha,r —
hath so just cause to complain, as the King himself hath .^
Now as we have told the success of the trumperies anc::*
cruelties of our own kings, and other great personages: sCi:*
we find, that God is everywhere the same God. And as if J
pleased him to punish the usurpation, and unnatural cruelty^C
of Henry the First, and of our third Edward, in their chil
dren for many generations: so dealt He with the sons o^^
Louis Debonnaire, the son of Charles the Great, or Charle
tnagne. For after such time as Debonnaire of France, hai^^
torn out the eyes of Bernard his nephew, the son of Pepin*"
the eldest son of Charlemagne, and heir of the Empire, and^E
then caused him to die in prison, as did our Henry to^
Robert his eldest brother : there followed nothing but mur- ■ —
ders upon murders, poisoning, imprisonments, and civil war; ^
till the whole race of that famous Emperor was extinguished. ■
And though Dcbonnaire, after he had rid himself of his
nephew by a violent death; and of his bastard brothers by
& civil death (having inclosed them with sure guard, all the
diys of their lives, within a monastery) held himself secure
Irom all opposition: yet God raised up against him (which
be suspected not) his own sons, to vex him, to invade him.
Id take him prisoner, and to depose him ; his own sons, with
whom (to satisfy their ambition) he had shared his estate,
md given them crowns to wear, and kingdoms to govern,
during his own life. Yea his eldest son, Lothair (for he
bid four, three by his first wife, and one by his second; to
wit, Lothair, Pepin, Louis, and Charles), made it the cause
of his deposition, that he had used violence towards his
brothers and kinsmen ; and that he had suffered his nephew
(whom he might have delivered) to be slain. " Eo quod,"
with the text,' " fratribus, et propinquis violentiam intulerit,
et nepotem suum, quem ipse liberare poterat, interfici per-
nueerit " : " Because he used violence to his brothers and
JoDsmen, and suffered his nephew to be slain whom he might
tan delivered."
Yet did he that which few kings do; namely, repent him
of his cruelty. For, among many other things which he per-
formed in the General Assembly of the States, it follows:
Post haec autem palam se errasse confessus, et imitatus
Imperatoris Theodosii exemplum, poenitentiam spontaneam
suscepit, tam de his, quam quae in Bernardum proprium
nepotem gesserat": "After this he did openly confess him-
self to have erred, and following the example of the Era-
P<ror Theodosias, he underwent voluntary penance, as well
*or his other offences, as for that which he had done against
Bernard his own nephew."
This he did; and it was praise -worthy. But the blood that
'S unjustly spilt, is not again gathered up from the ground
Vy repentance. These medicines, ministered to the dead,
**ave but dead rewards.
This king, as I have said, had four sons. To Lothair his
eldest he gave the Kingdom of Italy; as Charlemagne, his
father, had done to Pepin, the father of Bernard, who was
to succeed him in the Empire. To Pepin the second son he
' St^ Piuqnier£, ReeherdieB, lib. v. mp. i>
^^_ ^ and I
■ SIR WALTER RAUEIGH
fAre the Kingdom of Aquitatnc: to Lonh, Ac
of Bavaria : and to Charles, wbctn he had hj a
called Judith, the reniaiad«r of the Kingdom of Fi
dm lecoDd wife, being a inotfi«r-tn-lair* to the
loaded Debonoairc to cast bis ton Pepin out of
ttwrcbr to greaieo Charles, which, after the
Aon Pepia, be prosecuted to eJTect, against his
bearing Ibe same name. In the meanwhile, being
by bis son Louis of Bavaria, he dies for grief.
Dcbonnaire dead. Louis of Bavaria, and Charles after-
wards caUed the Bald, and their nephew Pepin, of
taine. join in league against the Emperor LotbaJr
eWest brother. They fight near to Auxerre the most '
battle that ever was stroken in France : in which, the
vetlous loss of nobility, and men of war, gave cosra^ to
Saracens to invade Italy ; to the Huns to fall upon Almainej
and the Danes to enter upon Normandy. Charles the Bald
by treason scizelh upon his nephew Pepin, kills htm in *
cloister : Carloman rebels against his father Charles
Bald, the father bums out the eyes of his son Carlotnan;
Bavaria invades the Emperor Lolhair his brother, Lothaif
qnits the Empire, he is assailed and wounded to the heart
by his own conscience, for his rebellion against his father,
and for his other cruelties, and dies in a monastery. Charles
the Bald, the uncle, oppresseth his nephews the sons of I
thair, he usurpeth the Empire to the prejudice of Louis
Bavaria his elder brother; Bavaria's armies and his s
Carloman are beaten, he dies of grief, and the usui
Charles is poisoned bv Zedechias a Jew, his physician,
■on Louts le Begue dies of the same drink. Bcgue
Charles the Simple and two bastards, Louis and Carloman)
they rebel against their brother, but the eldest breaks his
neck,_the younger is slain by a wild boar; the son " ""
had ttie same ill destiny, and brake his neck by a fall out ot
a window in sporting with his companions. Charles the
Gross becomes lord of all that the sons of Debonnaire held
in Germany: wherewith not contented, he invades Charles
the Simple: but being forsaken of his nobility, of his wif<_
^ and of his understanding, he dies a distracted beggar. Charles
' Step'inclher.
TO THE HISTOET OP THE WORLD
Simple is held in wardship by Eiidcs, Mayor of the
Palate, then by Robert the brother of Eudes: and lastly,
being taken by the Earl of Vermandois, he is forced to die
in tlie prison of Peron. Louis the son of Charles the
Simple breaks his neck in chasing a wolf, and of the two
sons of this Louis, the one dies of poison, the other dies
in the prison of Orleans; after whom Hugh Capet, of an-
other race, and a stranger to the French, makes himself
kine-,
These miserable ends had the issues of Debonnairc, who
aft«t- he had once apparelled injustice with authority, his
toas and successors took up the fashion, and wore that gar-
ment so long without other provision, as when the same was
torn, from their shoulders, every man despised them as
miserable and naked beggars. The wretched success they
•'^ (saith a learned Frenchman) shows, "que en ceste
oort il y avail plus du fait des bommes que de Dieu, on de
1» justice"; "that in the death of that Prince, to wit, of
Bernard the son of Pepin, the true heir of Charlemagne,
•nen had more meddling than either God or justice had."
But to come nearer home; it is certain that Francis the
f^i'st, one of the worthiest kings (except for that fact) that
•'^r Frenchmen had, d!d never enjoy himself, after he
"'J commended the destruction of the Protestajits of
Mirandol and Cabrieres, to the Parliament of Provence,
"hich poor people were thereupon burnt and murdered ;
"I**!, women, and children. It is true that the said King
Francis repented himself of the fact, and gave charge to
Henry his son, to do justice upon the murderers, threatening
^^ son with God's judgments, if he neglected it But this
""Seasonable care of his, God was not pleased to accept for
P^J^^nent For after Henry himself was slain in Sport by
Montgomery, we all may remember what became of his
'^'^T sons, Francis, Charles, Henry, and Hercules. Of
*"icb although three of them became kings, and were mar-
^*^ to beautiful and virtuous ladies: yet were they, one
Mter another, cast out of the world, without stock or seed,
'^nd notwithstanding their subtiiity, and breach of faith;
"th all their massacres upon those of the religion,' and
k.
M Snt WALTER RAI-EIGH
great effnnon of blood, the crown was set on his 1)
wImmb tbey all labored to dissolve; the Protestants red
nore ID iiimib«r Ihaa erer ihejr were, and hold to ttiia
more strong cities than ever tbey had.
Let OS DOW see if God be not the same God in Spalc
to Erglaud and FraiKX. Towards wliom we will lool
further bade than to Don Pedro of Castile: in respe^
which Prince, all the tyraots of Sicil, our Richard
Third, and the great Ivan Vasilowich of Moscow, were
petty ones: this Castilian, of aD Christian and heal
kings, having been the most merciJess. For, besides 6
of his own blood and nobility, which be caosed to be i
in his own court and chamber, as Sancho Riiis, the ^
master of Calatrava, Ruis Gonsales, Alphonso Tello,
Don John of Arragon, whom he cut in pieces and cast
the streets, denying him Christian burial: 1 say, bei
these, and the slaughter of Gomes Mauriques, Diego Pi
Alphonso Gomes, and the great commander of Castile;
made away the two infants of Arragon his cousin genu
his brother Don Frederick, Don John de la Cerde,
buquergues, Nugnes de Guzman, Come!, Cabrera, Tea
Mendes de Toledo, Guttiere his great treasurer and all
kindred; and a world of others. Neither did he spare
two youngest brothers, innocent princes: whom aftd
had kept in close prison from their cradles, till oiwl
them had lived sixteen years, and the other fourteen
murdered them there. Nay, he spared not his mother,
bis wife the Lady Blanche of Bourbon. Lastly, at
caused the Archbishop of Toledo, and the Dean to be k
of purpose to enjoy their treasures; so did he put to d
Mahomet Aben Alhamar, King of Barbary, with tU
seven of his nobility, tliat came unto him for succor, '
a great sum of money, to levy (by his favor) some i
panics of soldiers to return withal. Yea, he would o
assist the hangman with his own hand, in the executioi
the old king; in so much as Pope Urban dedareth hia
enemy both to God and man. But what was his end? ]
ing been formerly beaten out of his kingdom, and
established by the valor of the English nation, led by
iamous Duke of Lancaster: he was subbed to death b
TO THE HISTORY OP THE WORLD
younger brother t!ie Earl of Astramara, who dispossessed
all bis children of their inheritance; which, but for the
father's injustice and cruelty, had never been in danger of
any such thing.
If we can parallel any man with this king, it must be
Duke John of Burgogne, who, afler his traitorous murder
of the Duke of Orleans, caused the Constable of Armagnaq
the Chancellor of France, the Bishops of Constance, Bayeux,
Eureux, Senlis, Salutes, and other religious and reverend
Churchmen, the Earl of Gran Pre, Hector of Charlres, and
(in effect) all the officers of justice, of the Chamber of
Accounts, Treasury, and Request, (with sixteen hundred
Cithers to accompany them) to be suddenly and violently
ll^ Hereby, while he hoped to govern, and to have mas-
tered France, he was soon after struck wilh an axe in the
face, in the presence of the Dauphin; and, without any
leisure to repent his misdeeds, presently" slain. These were
\ht lovers of other men's miseries: and misery found them
nit.
Now for the kings of Spain, which lived both with Henry
the Seventh, Henry the Eiglith, Queen Mary, and Queen
Bizabeth; Ferdinand of Arragon was the first; and the
Srst that laid the foundation of the present Austrian great-
MES. For this King did not content himself to hold Arragon
lythe usurpation of his ancestor; and to fasten thereunto
the Kingdom of Castile and Leon, which Isabel his wife
licld by strong hand, and his assistance, from her own niece
the daughter of the last Henry: but most cruelly and craftily,
without al! color or pretence of right, he also cast his ovni
niece out of the Kingdom of Navarre, and, contrary to
faith, and the promise that he made to restore it, fortified
tte best places, and so wasted the rest, as tliere was no
UKans left for any army to invade it. This King, I say,
tlat betrayed also Ferdinand and Frederick, Kings of
Niples, princes of his own blood, and by double alliance
W unto him; sold them to the French: and with the same
■nny, sent for their succor under Gonsalvo, cast them out;
>nd shared their kingdom with the Freach, whom after-
1s tw most shamefully betrayed.
"IiuWiitlT.
1 greata
Btn WALTER XAUSOra
'^Mh W^ *'"' I^'*'*^ Kiag, who joM Heaven and his
'mm* ^ make his son. the Prioce of Spain, the gre
•^mwi^ "' *'" world; nw him die in the flower of
^i^tf*: Ali^ '''* ""'^^ E^^^t ^^ cfai3d, with ber untimely bi
^ MIM Aid together buried. His eldest daughter man
KiiHi Dun Alphonso, Prioce of Portagml, beheld her
ItMlMnJ brcsk bis neck is ber presence; and bein^
gluhl by her second, died with iL A jost judgment of
u^ii (he race of John, father to Alphooso, now w
WAtitipiishcd ; who had not oolj left many disconsol
uKitheri in Portugal, by the sLaugfaler of Uieir childi
bkll had formerly slain with his own hand, the son
(uily comfort of his aunt the Lady Beatrix, Duchess
7'he second daughter of Ferdinand, married to the Arc
Duka Philip, turned fool, and died mad and deprived." i~
third daughter, bestowed on King Henry the Eighth,
■HW cast off by the King: the mother of many troubles
F.ngland; and the mother of a daughter, that in her %
happy zeal shed a world of innocent blood; lost Calais
the French; and died heartbroken without increase,
conclude, all those kingdoms of Ferdinand have maafl
of a new name; and by a strange family are govera
and possessed.
Charles the Fifth, son to the Arch-Duke Philip, in v
vain enterprises upon the French, upon the Almaina,
other princes and states, so many multitudes of Chrtstjj
•oldicrs, and renowned captains were consumed; who gatj
the while a most perilous entrance to the Turks, and su£Fera
Rhodes, the Key of Christendom, to be taken; was tn co^
clu*ion chased out of France, and in a sort out of Germi
snd left to the French, Menu, Toule, and Verdun, pi:
belonging to the Empire, stole away from Inspurg;
scaled the Alps by torchlight, pursued by Duke Mauri
having hoped to swallow up all those dominions wherein
concocted nothing save his own disgraces. And ha-
after the slaughter of bo many millions of men, no one
of ground in either: he crept into a cloisler, and made
self a pensioner of an hundred tliousand ducats by
TO THE HISTORY OP THE "WORUD
yeaT, to his son Philip, from whom he very sJowly received
hiM mean and ordinary maintenance.
fjis son again King Philip the Second, not satisfied to
hoIc3 Holland and Zeeland, (wrested by hie ancestors from
Jacqueline their lawful Princess) and to possess in peace
many other provinces of the Netherlands: persuaded by
tha,t mischievous Cardinal of Granvile, and other Romish
tyrants; not only forgot the most remarkable services done
to his father the Emperor by the nobilities of those countries,
not only forgot the present made him upon his entry, of
forty millions of florins, called the " Novaile aide"; nor
only forgot that he had twice most solemnly sworn to the
General States, to maintain and preserve their ancient rights,
privileges, and customs, which they had enjoyed under their
thirty and five carls before him. Conditional Princes of those
provinces: but beginning first to constrain them, and en-
thrall them by the Spanish Inquisition, and then to im-
poverish them by many new devised and intolerable im-
positions ; he lastly, by strong hand and main force, at-
tempted to make himself not only an absolute monarch over
Ihera, like unto the kings and sovereigns of England and
France; but Turk-like to tread under his feet all their
xatural and fundamental laws, privileges, and ancient rights.
To effect which, after he had easily obtained from the
cope a. dispensation of his former oaths (which dispensation
*»i the tnie cause of the war and bloodshed since then;)
and after he had tried what he could perform, by dividing
of their own nobility, under the government of his base
sister Margaret of Austria, and the Cardinal Granvile;
fcft employed that most merciless Spaniard Don Ferdinand
■Alvarez of Toledo, Duke of Alva, followed with a powerful
*rniy of strange nations: by whom he first slaughtered that
^■enowned captain, the Earl of Egmont, Prince of Gavare:
*nd Philip Montmorency, Earl of Horn: made away Mon-
tigue, and the Marquis of Bergues, a.nd cut off in those six
years (that Alva governed) of gentlemen and others, eigh-
teen thousand and six hundred, by the hands of the hang-
roan, besides all his other barbarous murders and massacres.
By whose ministry when he could not yet bring his affairs
to their wished ends, having it in his hope to work that by
SIR WALTER RALEIGH
lubtiHty, which he had failed to perform by force; he sent
for governor his bastard brother Don John of Austria, k'
prince of great hope, and very gracious to those people. But
be, using the same papal advantage that his predecessors had
done, made no scruple to take oath upon the Hoiy Evangel-
ists, to observe the treaty made with the General States;
and to discharge the Low Countries of all Spaniards, and
other strangers therein garrisoned: towards whose pay and
passport, the Netherlands strained themselves to make pay-
ment of six hundred thousand pounds. Which monies re-
ceived, he suddenly surprised the citadels of Antwerp an^
Nemours: not doubling (being unsuspected by the states)^
to have possessed himself of all the mastering places of
those provinces. For whatsoever he overtly pretended, he
held in secret a contrary counsel with the Secretary Esco-
vedo, Rhodus, Barlemont, and others, ministers of the Span-
ish tyranny, formerly practised, and now again intended.
But let us now see the effect and end of this perjury and of
all other the Duke's cruelties. First, for himself, after ho
had murdered so many of the nobility ; executed (as afore-
said) eighteen thousand and six hundred in six years, and'
most cruelly slain man, woman, and child, in Mechlin, Zut-
phen, Naerden, and other places: notwithstanding hit
Spanish vaunt, that he would suffocate the Hollanders iB
their own butter-barrels, and milk-tubs ; he departed thA
country no otherwise accompanied, than with the curse and
detestation of the whole nation ; leaving his master's affairs
in a tenfold worse estate, than he found them at his first
arrival. For Don John, whose haughty conceit of himself
overcame the greatest difficulties ; though his judgment were
over-weak to manage the least: what wonders did his fear-
ful breach of faith bring forth, other than the King hii
brother's jealousy and distrust, with the untimely death
that seized him, even in the flower of his youth? Aut
for Escovedo his sharp-witted secretary, who in his owO'
imagination had conquered for his master both Englan4
and the Netherlands ; being sent into Spain upon some new
project, he was at the first arrival, and before any accest
to the King, by certain ruffians appointed by Anthony Peres
^though by better warrant than his) rudely murdered ia
TO THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD
is own lodging. Lastly, if we consider the King of Spain's
' , his counsel and success in this business, there is
nothing left to the memory of man more remarkable. For
ht hath paid above an hundred millions, and the lives of
above four hundred thousand Christians, for the loss of all
those countries ; which, for beauty, gave place to none ;
and for revenue, did equal his West Indies: for the loss
ot a nation which most willingly obeyed him ; and who at
this day, after forty years war, arc in despite of all his
forces become a free estate, and far more rich and power-
ful than they were, when he first began to impoverisb und
oppress them.
Oh, by what plots, by what forswearings, betrayings,
oppressions, imprisonments, tortures, poisonings, and under
what reasons of state, and politic subtlety, have these fore-
named kings, both strangers, and of our own nation, pulled
ihe vengeance of God upon themselves, upon theirs, and
upon their prudent ministers ! and in the end have brought
ftose things to pass for their enemies, and seen an effect
so directly contrary to all their own counsels and cruelties;
as the one could never have hoped for themselves ; and the
other never have succeeded; if no such opposition had ever
been made. God hath said it and performed it ever:
"Perdam sapientiatn sapientum"; "I will destroy the wi»-
dom of the wise."
But what of all this ? and to what end do we lay before the
eyes of the living, the fall and fortunes of the dead : seeing
the world is the same that it hath been; and the children of
the present time, will still obey their parents? It is in the
present time that all the wits of the world are exercised.
To hold the times we have, we hold all things lawful: and
dtber we hope to hold them forever; or at least we hope
&a.t there is nothing after them to be hoped for. For as we
arc content to forget our own experience, and to counter-
felt the ignorance of our own knowledge, in all things that
concern ourselves; or persuade ourselves, that God hafli
given us letters patents to pursue all our irreligious affecr
tions, with a "non obstante"" so we neither look behind us
what hath been, nor before us what shall be. It is true,
u ■■ Jjoiiuiig hindniiig,"
I
I
M nit WALTER RAIiUOH
that tfie qnsntlty wliich we have, is of the body ; we an t
jt joined to the earth; wc are compounded of earth; U
yre inhabit it. The Heavens are high, far o£F, and unseard
able: we have sense and feeling of corporal things; and I
eternal grace, but by revelation. No marvel then that 9
thoughts are aho earthly : and it is less to be wondered )
that the words of worthless men can not cleanse thSI
seeing their doctrine and instruction, whose understandil
the Holy Ghost vouchsafed to inhabit, have not perfonOI
it. For as the Prophet Isaiah cried out long ago, "Lai
who hath believed our reports?" And out of doubt,
Isaiah complained then for himself and others: so are t
less believed, every day after other. For although religk
and the truth thereof be in every man's mouth, yea, in
discourse of every woman, who for the greatest number
but idols of vanity: what is It other than an universal i
simulation ? We profess that we know God: but by v/a
we deny him. For beatitude doth not consist in the bna
edge of divine things, but in a divine life: for the De
know them belter than men. " Beatitude non est dlvinoi
cognitio, sed vita divina." And certainly there is nottii
more to be admired, and more to be lamented, than 1
private contention, the passionate dispute, the persa
hatred, and the perpetual war, massacres, and murders I
religion among Christians: the discourse whereof hath
occupied the world, as it hath well near driven the pratl
thereof out of the world. Who would not soon resolve, t'
took knowledge but of the religious disputations among n
and not of their lives which dispute, that there were
Other thing in their desires, than the purchase of Hcavt
and that the world itself were but used as it ought, and
an tnn or place, wherein to repose ourselves in passing
towards our celestial habitation ? when on the contrary, '
aides the discourse and outward profession, the soul b
nothing but hypocrisy. We are all (in effect) becd
comedians in religion: and while wo act in gesture
Toice, divine virtues, in all the course of our lives we
nounce our persons, and the parts we play. For Chai
Justice, and Truth have but their being in ttmu, like
philosopher's Materia prima.
to THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD
95
Neither is it that wisdom, which Solomon defineth to be
the "Schoolmistress of tlie knowledge of God," that hath
valuition in the world: it is enough tliat we give it our
goDil word : but the same wliich is altogetlier exercised in
the service of the world as the gathering of riches chic%,
I17 which we purchase and obtain honor, with the many
respects which attend it. These indeed be the marks, which
(when we have bent our consciences to the highest) we
ill shoot at. For the obtaining whereof it is true, that the
care is our own ; the care our own in this life, the peril our
Dwn in the future: and yet when we have gathered the
greatest abundance, we ourselves enjoy no more thereof,
ihm so much aa belongs to one man. For tiie rest, he that
had the greatest wisdom and the greatest ability that ever
man had. hath told us that this is the use : " When goods in-
crease (saith Solomon) they also increase that eat them;
Md what good cometh to the owners, but the beholding there-
of with their eyes ? As for those that devour the rest, and
Mow us in fair weather: they again forsake us in the first
tempest of misfortune, and steer away before the sea and
wind; leaving us to the malice of our destinies. Of these,
smong a thousand examples. I will fake but one out of Master
Danner. and use his own words: "Whilest the Emperor
Charles the Fifth, after the resignation of his estates, stayed
3t Flushing for wind, to carry him his last journey into
Spain; he conferred on a time with Seldius, his brother
Ferdinand's Ambassador, till the deep of tlie night And
when Seldius should depart, the Emperor calling for some
of his servants, and nobody answering him (for those that
attended upon him, were some gone to their lodgings, and
^" the rest asleep), the Emperor took up the candle himself,
*"d went before Seldius to light him down the stairs; and
^ did, notwithstanding all the resistance that Seldius could
"^^ne. And when he was come to the stair's foot, he said
*«"! unlo him: "Seldius. remember this of Charles the Em-
P^^'or, when he shall be dead and gone, that him. whom thou
*st^ known in thy time environed with so many mighty
^P^'ies and guards of soldiers, thou hast also seen alone,
^™ndoned, and forsaken, yea even of his own domestical
*^vaDts, &C. I acknowledge this change of Fortune to pro-
Sm WALTBB RALXiaa
ceed from tfae mighty band of God, which I will b; no
means go about to withstand."
But you will 5ay, that there arc some things else, and of
greater regard than the former. The first is the reverend
respect that is held of great men, and the honor done unto
them by all sorts of people. And tl is true indeed; provided,
that an inward love for their justice and piety accompany
the outward worship given to their places and power ;
out which what is the applause of the muJtitode. but a
outcry of an herd of animals, who without the knowledge of
any true cause, please themselves with the noise they make?
For seeing it is a thing exceeding rare, to distinguish
Virtue and Fortune: the most impious (if prosperous) hav«
ever been applauded; the most virtuous (if unprosperous)
have ever been despised. For as Fortune's man rides th«
horse, so Fortune herself rides the man; who when he •*
descended and on foot, the man taken from his beast, i
Fortune from the man, a base groom beats the one, and ■
bitter contempt spurns at the other, with equal liberty.
The second is the greatening of our posterity, and the
contemplation of their glory whom we leave behind o*"'
Certainly, of those which conceive that their souls departed
take any comfort therein, it may be truly said of 1'
which Laclantius spake of certain heathen philosophers*
" quod sapientes sunt in re stulta.'"* For when our spirits
immortal shall be once separate from our mortal bodieSi
and disposed by God ; there remaineth in them no other jo^
of their posterity which succeed, than there doth of prid*
in that stone, which sleepeth in the wall of the king*i
palace; nor any other sorrow for their poverty, than thcf
doth of shame in that, which bearelh up a beggar's cO*
tage. " Nesciunt mortui, etiam sancti. quid agunt vi^-i, etial
eorum filli, quia animae mortuorum rebus viventium bO
intersunt": "The dead, though holy, know nothing of t***
living, no, not of their own children: for the souls of thos*
departed, are not conversant with their affairs that **^^
main.'"* And if we doubt of St Augustine, we can not *=* *
Job; who tells us, "That we know not if our sons shall t»^
" "That they are wise in B fooHih nMtler."— l*c*«itio«, Dt /alia rt^f^
■TO THE HISTORY OP THE WORJLD
RWrahle: neither shall we understand concerning them,
Whcr they shall be of low degree." Which Ecdesiastes
' coafirmeth : " Man walkelh in a shadow, and disquietcth
Bclf in vain: he heapeth up riches, and can not tell who
-"-'J gather them. The living (saith he) know that they
shaU die, but the dead know nothing at all : for who can
sbovr unto man what shaU be after him under the sun?"
■He Iherefore accoimleth it among the rest of worldly vani-
ties, to labor and travail in the world ; not knowing after
death whether a fool or a wise man should enjoy the fruits
thereof: "which made me (saith he) endeavor even to ab-
hor rriine ovm labor." And what can other men hope, whose
bless^<^ or sorrowful estates after death God hath reserved?
to^ s knowledge lying hut in his hope, seeing the Prophet
Isaiali confesseth of the elect, " That Abraham is ignorant of
*>*> *Hd Israel knows us not." But hereof we are assured,
that (;^,g ]pj,g 3j,j j]gj.[j nigfjt of death (of whose following
^y ^"^e shall never behold the dawn till his return that hath
tnurr»j,i,ed over it), shall cover us over till the world be no
"J"'^- After which, and when we shall again receive organs
glortf^gjj gjj^j incorruptible, the seats of angelical affections,
"^ ?*-* great admiration shall the souls of the blessed be ex-
ereis^d^ as they can not admit the mixture of any second
^"'less joy; nor any return of foregone and mortal affeclion
*?*^*-ds friends, kindred, or children. Of whom whether we
T^^^ retain any particular knowledge, or in any sort dis-
"^^"'-lish them, no man can assure us: and the wisest tn«n
~?''^t But on the contrary, if a divine life retain any
*" t*i«jse faculties which the soul exercised in a mortal body,
*^ ^ball not at that time so divide the joys of Heaven, as
5^^^-st any part thereof on the memory of their felicities
,™*^*i remain in the world. No, be their estates greater
"Wt* gver the world gave, we shall (by the difference knovro
I nntc* us) even detest their consideration. And whatsoever
I ^"^ ^^rt shall remain of all forepast, the same will consist in
I . _^iharity which we exercised living; and in that piety,
I of '^^'^i ^"'^ fi™i faith, for which It pleased the infinite mercy
L lL*^^°'^ 'o accept of us, and receive us. Shall we there-
^^S[^ value honor and riches at nothing? and neglect them,
^^BV^xmecessary and vain? Certainly no. For that infinite
^^^B (4) HU— Vol.
N
m snt waltbh baleigh
wisdom of God, which hath distinguished his angcli \if
degrees; which hath given greater and less light and beauty
to heavenly bodies; which haih made differences between
beasts and birds ; created the eagle and the fly, the cedar and
the shrub ; and among stones, given the fairest tincture to
the ruby, and the quickest light to the diamond; hath also
nrdajned kings, dukes, or leaders of the people, magistrates,
judges, and other degrees among men. And as honor is
left to posterity, for a mark and ensign of the virtue Ziut
understanding of their ancestors: so (seeing Siracides pre*
ferreth death before beggary: and that titles, without pro--
portionable estates, fall under the miserable succor of other
men's pity) I account it foolishness to condemn such a care;
provided, that worldly goods be well gotten, and that w*
reise not our own buildings out of other men's ruins. For,
aa Plato doth first prefer the perfection of bodily healthl
secondly, the form and beauty ; and thirdly, " Divitias nuUa
fraude quaesitas":" so Jeremiah cries, "Woe unto thetn
that erect their houses by unrighteousness, and their chani'
bers without equity": and Isaiah the same, "Woe to thos«:
that spoil and were not spoiled." And it was out of th»
true wisdom of Solomon, that he commandeth us, "not to
drink the wine of violence ; not to lie in wait for blood, and
not to swallow them up alive, whose riches we covet: for
(nch are the ways (saith he) of everyone that is greedy*
of gain."
And if we could afford ourselves but so much leisure as M
consider, that he which hath most in the world, hath,
respect of the world, nothing in it: and that he which hath,
the longest time lent him to live in it, hath yet no proportioB-
at all therein, setting it either by that which is past, whoi'
we were not, or by that time which is to come, in which
shall abide forever: I say, if both, to wit, our proportioftl
in the world, and our time in the world, differ not mudl
from that which is nothing; it is not out of any excellency
of understanding, that we so much prize the one, which halh
(in effect) no being: and so much neglect the other, which
hath no ending: coveting those mortal things of the worl^
as if our souls were therein immortal ; and neglecting those
** " Wealth iGquired without fraud."
Jitiags which are immortal, as if ourselves after the world
were but mortal.
But let evei7 man value his own wisdom, as he pleaseth.
Let the rich man think all fools, that cannot equal his
atiujuiance : the revenger esteem all negligent, that have not
trocJden down their opposites; the politician, all gross that
ca.r»rot merchandise their faith : yet when we once come in
sight of the port of death, to which all winds drive us, and
when by letting fall that fatal anclior, which can never be
y«ighed again, the navigation of this life takes end; then
't is, I say, that our own cogitations (those sad and severe
t^ogitations. formerly beaten from us by our health and
'el icily) return again, and pay us to the uttermost for all
*He pleasing passages of our lives past. It is then that we
Cy out to God for mercy; then when our selves can no
longer exercise cruelty to others; and it is on!y then, that
]^e are strucken through the soul with this terrible sentence,
That God will not be mocked." For if according to SL Peter,
The righteous scarcely be saved: and diat God spared not
*^4s angels"; where shall those appear, who, having served
'Heir appetites alt their lives, presume to think, that the
®^"vere commandments of the all-powerful Cod were given
^tit in sport; and that the short breath, which we draw when
^^ath presseth us, if we can hot fashion it to the sound of
**»ercy (without any kind of satisfaction or amends) is
^MiBcient? "O quam multi," saith a reverend father, "cum
**ac spe ad aeternos labores et bella descenduut ! "" I con-
^«ss that it is a great comfort to our friends, to have it said,
*tiat we ended well; for we all desire (as Balaam did)
* to die the death of the righteous." But what shall we
^^^all a disesteeming, an opposing, or (indeed) a mocking of
^3o<i: if those men do not oppose Him, disesteem Him, and
•:^*iock Hira, that think it enough for God, to ask Him for-
^gpveness at leisure, with the remainder and last drawing of a
*r«ialicious breath? For what do they otherwise, that die this
"i^ind of well-dying, but say unto God as followeth? "We
teseech Thee, O God, that all the falsehoods, forswearings,
^nd treacheries of our lives past, may be pleasing unto
*~Ihee; that Thou wilt for our sakes (that have had no
»"0 how many go down with lliis hope to endleaa laborj ind wars."
fflK WALTER RALEIGH
J
leisure to do anything for Thine) change Thy nature
(though impossible, and forget to be a just God; that Thou
wilt love injuries and oppressions, call ambition wisdom, ax>d
charity foolishness. For I shall prejudice ray son (whic:!*
I am resolved not to do) if 1 make restitution; and confess
myself to have been unjust (which I am too proud to do
if I deliver the oppressed." Certainly, these wise worldlia,
have either found out a new God, or made one ; and in s
likelihood such a leaden one, as Louis the Eleventh wore
his cap; which when he had caused any that he feared, *
hated, to be killed, he would take it from his head and Hsi
it: beseeching it to pardon him this one evil act more, aa<I
it should be the last; which (as at other times) he did, wheO
by the practice of a cardinal and a falsified sacrament, he
caused the Earl of Armagnac to be stabbed to death: mock-
eries indeed fit to be used towards a leaden, but not towards
the ever-living God. But of this composition are all devout
lovers of the world, that they fear all that is dureless"
ridiculous: they fear the plots and practises of their op-
posiles," and their very whisperings: they fear the opinioos
of men, which beat but upon shadows: they flatter and for-
sake the prosperous and unprosperous, be they friends oi
kings: yea they dive under water, like ducks, at every
pebblestone, that is but thrown toward them by a powerful
hand : and on the contrary, they show an obstinate and giant-
like valor, against the terrible judgments of the all-powerful
God: yea they show themselves gods against God, and slaves
towards men ; towards men whose bodies and consciences are
alike rotten.
Now for the rest: If we truly examine the difference o£
both conditions; to wit, of the rich and mighty, whom we
call fortunate; and of the poor and oppressed, whom we
account wretched: we shall find the happiness of the one,
and the miserable estate of the other, so tied by God to
the very instant, and both so subject to interchange (wit-
ness the sudden downfall of the greatest princes, and the
speedy uprising of the meanest persons) as the one hath
nothing bo certain, whereof to boast; nor the other so un-
certain, whereof to bewail itself. For there is no OiBfl
TO THE 'HISTORT OF THE WORLD
101
b assured of his hoiioc, 'of, -"Jiis, riches, health, or life; but
bit he may be deprived of '-' either,'; or all, the very next
Bur or day to come, " Quid vcsptr.-'yebst, incerttun est,"
rWtat the evening will bring witK 'if,, it is.' uncertain."
pAnd yet ye cannot tell (saith St. James) v^haf ,siia]l be
norrow. Today he is set up, and tomorrow he sbail-Mot
e found; for he is turned into dust, and his purpose ^cr-; .
And although the air which corapasseth adversity ■
B very obscure ; yet tlierein we better discern God, than
bthatshining light which environeth worldly glory; through
"rtiicli, for the clearness thereof, there is no vanity which
tscapeth our sight And let adversity seem what it will;
to happy men ridiculous, who make themselves merry at
t other men's misfortunes ; and to those under the cross, griev-
}«us: yet this is true, that for all that is past, to the very
instant, the portions remaining are equal to either. For
be it that we have lived many years, "and (according to
Solomon) in them all we have rejoiced;" or be it that we
J have measured the same length of days and therein have
T erermore sorrowed: yet looking back from our present
\ Wng, we find both the one and the other, to wit, the joy
^1 and tiie woe, sailed out of sight; and death, which doth
J pursue us and hold us in chase, from our infancy, hath
'J p"'"ed it. " Quicquid aetatis retro est, mors tenet :"
3 Whatsoever of our age is past, death holds it." So as
|1 whosoever he be, to whom Fortune hath been a servant,
J find (he Time a friend; let him hut take the account of his
7 fflcmory (for we have no other keeper of our pleasures past),
( *^d truly examine what it hath reserved either beauty and
J t"""'' '"'^ foregone delights; what it hath saved, that it might
J "^K of Jiis dearest affections, or of whatever else the amor-
7 Ws springtime gave his thoughts of conlentmenl, then un-
! "'"able; and he shall find that all the art which his elder
■■^''^ have, can draw no other vapor out of these dis-
utious, than heavy, secret, and sad sighs. He shall find
thing remaining, but those sorrows, which grow up after
^^ ^a.st- springing youth; overtake it, when it is at a stand;
«ia c»-vertopped it utterly, when it begins to wither: in so
_ UcH as looking hack from the very instant time, and from
n«w being, the poor, diseased, and captive creature^
»
hath as little sense of all hi^' former miseries and
as he, that U most hle^scd in common opinions, hath of
fore-passed pleasnrc . and delights. For whatsoeyer is
behind us, H jii&t 'nothing : and what is to come, deceit!
hope ktih it; " Omnia quae evcntura sunt, in incetto
cent."" ' Only those few black swans, I must except:
having had the grace to value worldly vanities at no mc
. than their own price; do, by retaining the comfortable m(
ory of a well acted life, behold death without dread, and
grave without fear; and embrace both, as necessary guii
to endless glory.
For myself, this is my consolation, and all that I
offer to others, that the sorrows of this life are but o!
sorts: whereof the one hath reipect to God. the other,'
the world- In the 6rst we complain to God a^inst oursel
for our offences against Him; and confess, " Et Tu ji
es in omnibus quae venerunt super nos." "And ThouJ
Lord, are just in all that hath befallen us." In the
we complain to ourselves against God: as if he had doni
wrong, either in not giving us worldly goods and hoiK
answering our appetites: or for taking them again fl
us having had them; forgetting that humble and just
knowledgment of Job, "the Lord hath given, and the I
hath taken." To the first of which St, Paul hath promi
blessedness: to the second, death. And out of doubt b|
either a fool, or ungrateful to God, or both, that doth
acknowledge, how mean soever his estate he, that the s
is yet far greater than that which God oweth him: or I
not acknowledge, how sharp soever his afflictions be,
the same are yet far less, than those which are due
him. And if an heathen wise man call the adversities ol
world but " tributa vivendi," " the tributes of living ;" a '
Christian man ought to know them, and bear them,
as the tributes of offending. He ought to bear them maill
and resolvedly ; and not as those whining soldiers do, *
gementes sequuntur imperalorem.""
For seeing God, who is the author of all our traj
hath written out for us and appointed us all the partBJ
TO THE HIBTOEY OF THE WORLD
are to play: and hath not, in their distribution, been partial
to the most mighty princes of the worid ; that gave unto
Dwius the part of the greatest emperor, and the part of
the most miacrable beggar, a beggar begging water of an
enemy, to quench tiie great drought of death : that appointed
BlJMet to play the Grand Signior of the Turks in the mom-
ing, and in the same day tlie footstool of Tamerlane (both
which parts Valerian had also played, being taken by Sa-
porej): that made Belisarius play the most victorious cap-
tain, and lastly the part of a blind beggar; of which ck-
anples many thousands may be produced : why should other
men, who are but as the least worms, complain of wrong?
Certainly there is no other account to be made of this ridic-
ulous world, than to resolve, that the change of fortune on the
great theatre, is but as the change of garments on the less.
For when on the one and the other, every man wears but
Ws own skin, the players arc all alike. Now, if any man
out of weakness prize the passages of this world otherwise
(for saith Petrarch, " Magni ingenii est revocare mentem
S sensibus"") it ia by reason of that unhappy phantasy of
"Urs, which forgeth in tiie brains of man all the miseries
(the corporal excepted) whercunto he is subject. Therein
't is, that misfortunes and adversity work all that they
*Ork. For seeing Death, in the end of tlie play, takes from
m whatsoever Fortune or Force takes from any one; it
Were a foolish madness in the shipwreck of worldly things,
Vhere all sinks but the sorrow, to save it. That were, as
Seneca saith, " Fortunae succumbere, quod tristius est omni
fato :" " To fall under Fortune, of' ail other the most miser-
able destiny."
Xut it is now time to sound a retreat; and to desire to be
•accused of this long pursuit: and withai, that the good in-
teiai, which hath moved me to draw the picture of time
tia.st (which we call History) in so large a table, may also
bes accepted in place of a better reason.
The examples of divine providence, everywhere found
(tile first divine histories being nothing else but a continu-
ation of such examples) have persuaded me to fetch my
l^eginmng from the beginning of all things: to wit. Creation,
" It tilui eeeiil feaius to call becli Um mind from the md<
DM SIB WALTER RALBIOR
For though these two glorious ictions of th« Alndghtirl
BO near, and (as it were) linked together, that the o
sarily unptieth the other : Creation inferring Providence (fl
what father forsaketh the child that he hath begotten?) a
Providence pre-supposing Creation : yet many of those tl
have seemed to excel in worldly wisdom, have gone abo
to disjoin this coherence ; the epicure denying both C
and Providence, but granting the world had i
the Aristotelian granting Providence, but denying t
creation and the beginning.
Now although this doctrine of faith, touching the c
in time (for by faith we understand, that the world u
made by the word of God), be too weighty a work f
Aristotle's rotten ground to bear up, upon which he hath ]
(notwithstanding) founded the defences and fortresses of
all his verba! doctrine: yet that the necessity of infinitB
power, and the world's beginning, and the impossibility of
' the contrary even in the judgment of natural reason, where-
in he believed, had not better informed him; it is greatU
to be marvelled at. And it is no less strange, that tb«'
nen which are desirous of knowledge (seeing Aristotle baft
failed in this main point ; and taught little athe~ than tettd
in the rest) have so retrenched their minds from the folloiP
ing and overtaking of truth, and so absolutely
jected themselves to the law of those philosophical >■— ^™
ciples; as all contrary kind of teacliing, in the search <n
causes, they have condemned either for phantastical, <
curious. Both doth it follow, that the positions of heaths
philosophers are undoubted grounds and principles indeed
because so called? Or that ipsi dixemnl, doth make them W
be such? Certainly no. But this is true, that where natural
reason hath built anything so strong against itself, as t
same reason can hardly assail it, much less batter it down!
the same in every question of nature, and infinite powefi
may be approved for a fundamental law of human knowW
edge. For saith Charron in his book of wisdom, "Tout*
proposition humaine a auiant d'authorite quel'autre, si b
raison n'on fait la difference ;" " Every human proposidoi
hath equal authority, if reason make not the difference," the
feet being but the fables of principles. But hereof how shall
TO THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD
105
the upright and impartial judgment of man give a sentence,
where opposition and examination are not admitted to give
in evidence? And to this purpose it was well said of Lac-
tantius, " Sapienliam sibi adimunt. qui sine ullo judicio in-
venta maiorum probant, et ab aliis pecudum more ducuntur:"
"They neglect their own wisdom, who without any judg-
ment approve the invention of those that forewent them;
and suffer themselves after the manner of beasts, to be led
y>y them;" by the advantage of which sloth and dullness,
'Snorance is now become so powerful a tyrant, as it hath set
ttue philosophy, physics, and divinity in a pillory; and writ-
ten over the first, "Contra negantem principia;"" over tlie
Stcond, "Virtus specifica;"" over the third, " Ecclesia
Itomana.""
But for myself, I shall never be persuaded, that God hath
shut up all light of learning within the lanthom of Aris-
lotle's brains: or that it was ever said unto him, as unto
Esdras, " Accendam in carde ttio Lucernam intellectus"^
thai God hath given invention but to the heathen, and that
they only invaded nature, and found the strength and bottom
thereof; the same nature having consumed all her store, and
left nothing of price to after-ages. That these and these
be the causes of these and these effects, time hath taught
us : and not reason : and so hath experience without art. The
cheese-wife knoweth it as well as the philosopher, that sour
rennet doth coagulate her milk into a curd. But if we ask
a reason of this cause, why the sourness doth it? whereby
it doth it? and the manner how? I think that there is
nothing to be found in vulgar philosophy, to satisfy this
and many other like vulgar questions. But man to cover his
ignorance in the least things, who can not give a true
reason for the grass under his feet, why it should be green
rather than red, or of any other color; that could never yet
discover the way and reason of nature's working, in those
which are far less noble creatures than himself; who is far
more noble than the heavens themselves: "Man (saith
Solomon) that can hardly discern the things that are upon
■'■Spscffic vShuT. ot ^wlr."' ""'"ffhe Roman Church."
'**"! itull light B lamp o{ underMondins in thine heart." — IV. Eadiw
SIR WALTER RALKIGH
the eartb, and with great labor find out the diings that VS
before us"; that hath so short a time in the world, as he
no sooner begins to learn, than to die; tliat hath i
memory but borrowed knowledge; in his tmderstanding,
notliing truly; that is ignorant ol the essence of bis own
soul, and which the wisest of the naturalists (if AristDiIe
be he) i:auld never so much as define, but by the action and
effect, telling us what it works (which all men knew as well
as he) but not what it is, which neither he, nor any els^
doth know, but God that created it; ("For though I
perfect, yet I know not my soul," saith Job). Man, I say.
that is but an idiot in the next cause of his own life, a
in the cause of all actions of h!s life, will (notwithstanding)
examine the art of God in creating the world; of God, v
(saith Job) " is so excellent as we know him not " ; and ex-
amine the beginning of the work, which had end befoH
mankind bad a beginning of being. He will disable God'l
power to make a world, without matter to make it c
will rather give the motes of the air for a cause; cast tM
work on necessity or chance ; bestow the honor thereof on b
ture ; make two powers, the one to be the author of the tnatti
the other of the form; and lastly, for want of a workmai^
have it eternal: which latter opinion Aristotle, to make hint'
self the author of a new doctrine, brought into the world)
and his Sectators" have maintained it; " parati ac conjtinti,
quos Eequuntur. philosophonim animis invictis opinionea
tueri."" For Hermes, who lived at once with, or soon after
Moses, Zoroaster, Musaeus, Orpheus, Linus, Anaximene^
Anaxagoras, Empedocles, Melissus, Phcrecydes, Thateqi
Cleanthes, Pythagoras, Plato, and many other (whose opiil*
ions are exquisitely gathered by Steuchias Eugubinus) fouoj
in the necessity of invincible reason, " One eternal and ta*
finite Being," to be the parent of the universal. "HonUB
omnium sententia quamvis sit tncerta, eodem tamen spt
ut Providentiara unam esse consentiant: sive eni
sive aether, sive ratio, sive mens, sive fatalis necessitas, sivi
dJvina lex : idem est quod a nobis dicitur Deus " : " All thtsj
men's opinions (saith Laciantius) though uncertain, come H
" Followcn.
" " Prepared and sworn to proteel with unceaquertd mindi tbe o
of the philoupheis whom the; follow."
TO THE HISTORY OP THE ■WOHUJ
this; That they agree upon one Providence; whether the
ssttnf be nature, or I'glit, or reason, or understanding,
destiny, or divine ordinance, that it is the same which we
call God," Certainly, as all the rivers in the world, though
they have divers risings, and divers runnings; though they
sometimes hide themselves for a while under ground, and
seem to be lost in sea-like lakes; do at last find, and fall
into the great ocean: so after all the searches that human
capacity hatli, and after all philosophical contemplation and
curiosity; in the necessity of this infinite power, all the rea-
son of man ends and dissolves itself.
Ab for the others; the first touching those which conceive
the matter of the world to have been eternal, and that God
did Hot create the world " Exnihilo,"" but "ex materia
praeexJstente " :" the supposition is so weak, as is hardly
worth the answering. For (sailh Eusehius) " Mihi videntur
qui hoc dicunt, fortunam quoque Deo aniiectere," "They
atm unto me, which affirm this, to give part of the work to
God, and part to Fortune": insomuch as if God had not
found this first matter by chance, He had neither been au-
thor nor father, nor creator, nor lord of the universal. For
*cre the matter or chaos eternal, it then follows, that either
this supposed matter did fit itself to God, or God aceommo-
ii»te Himself to the matter. For the first, it is impossible,
that things without sense could proportion themselves to
the workman's will. For the second: it were horrible to
conceive of God, that as an artificer He applied himself,
according to the proportion of matter which He lighted
Upon.
But let it be supposed, that this matter hath been made
by any power, not omnipotent, and infinitely wise ; I wouM
gladly learn how it came to pass, that the same was pro-
i»Tt(onab!e to his intention, that was omnipotent and infi-
nitely wise ; and no more, nor no less, than served to receive
^< form of the universal. For, had it wanted anything of
what was sufficient ; then must it he granted, that God created
<"" of nothing so much new matter, as served to finish the
"^rlc of the world: or had there heen more of this matter
'^a sufficed, then God did dissolve and annihilate whatao
**" Out td nothing." ** " Out of pt»<xistuig matter."
Sm WALTER RALEIOn
I
I
ever remained and was superfluous. And t
reasonable soul confess, that it is
ilone, to create anything out of nothing, ;
art and power, and by none other, can those things, or wxf.
part of that eternal mailer, be again changed into nothii^}
fay which those things, that once were nothing, obtained ■
beginning of being.
Again, to say that this matter was the cause of itself; thi^
of all other, were the greatest idiotisin. For, if it were ttai
cause of itself at any time; then there was also a time who
itself was not: at which time of not being, it is easy enougl
to conceive, that it could neither procure itself, nor aiqi
thing else. For to be, and not to be, at once, is impossibS
"Nihil autcm seipsum praecedit, nequc; seipsum compoq
corpus " : " There is nothing that doth precede itself, neitlH
do bodies compound themselves."
For the rest, those that feign this matter to be eterMl
must of necessity confess, that infinite cannot be separa)
from eternity. And then had infinite matter left no plae
for infinite form, but that the first matter was finite, tb
form which it received proves it. For conclusion of thi
part, whosoever will make choice, rather to believe in eterai
deformity, or in eternal dead matter, than in eternal li^
and eternal life: let eternal death be his reward. For i
is a madness of that kind, as wanteth terms to express i
For what reason of man (whom the curse of presuraptio
hath not stupefied) hath doubted, that infinite power (6
which we can comprehend but a kind of shadow, " qui
comprehensio est intra terminos, qui infinite repugnant"''
hath anything wanting in itself, either for matter of fora
yea for as many worlds (if such had been God's will) (
the sea hath sands? For where the power is without liiu
tation, the work hath no other limitation, than the workmai^
will. Yea reason itself finds it more easy for infinite pavri
to deliver from itself a finite world, without the help ^
matter prepared; than for a finite man, a fool and duaj
to change the form of matter made to his hands. They af
Dionysius his words, " Deus in una existentia omnia pra*
" " Beeauee campreh«iiioii ii beCwecD limitt, wblcb are oppowd I
Iiabet " :" and again, " Esse ornnium est ipsa divinitas, omne
quod vides, et quod non vides " :" to wit, " causaliter," or in
better terms, " non tanquam forma, sed tanquam causa uni-
versalis." " Neither hath the world universal closed up all
of God: "For the most part of his works (saith Siracides)
^^e hid." Neither can the depth of his wisdom be opened,
by the glorious work of the world: which never brought
to knowledge all it can; for then were his infinite power
bounded and made finite. And hereof it comes; That we
seldom entitle God the all-showing, or the all-willing; but
the Almighty, that is, infinitely able.
But now for those, who from that ground, "that out of
nothing, nothing is made," infer the world's eternity ; and yet
not so savage therein, as those are, which give an eternal be-
ing to dead matter: it is true if the word (nothing) be taken
in the affirmative; and the making, imposed upon natural
agents and finite power; that out of nothing, nothing is
made. But seeing their great doctor Aristotle himself
confesseth, "quod omnes antiqui decreverunt quasi quodam
rcrum principium, ipsumque infinitum:" "That all the an-
cient decree a kind of beginning, and the same to be infinite " ;
and a little after, more largely and plainly, " Principium
Mus est nullum, sed Ipsura omnium cernitur esse principium,
ac omnia, complecti ac regere " :" it is strange that this
philosopher, with his followers, should rather make choice
out of falsehood, to conclude falsely; than out of truth, to
resolve truly. For if we compare the world universal, and
all the unmeasureable orbs of Heaven, and those marvellous
bodies of the sun, moon, and stars, with " ipsum infinitum":
it may truly be said of them all, which himself affirms of
his imaginary " Materia prima,"" that they are neither
quid, quale," nor " quantum " ; and therefore to bring finite
(which hath no proportion with infinite) out of infinite
("qui destruit omnem proportionem"") is no wonder in
God's power. And therefore Anaximander, Melistus, and
Empedocles, call the world universal, but " particulam uni-
all Ihin^ ir
,,.,,. =«=..i,: of .11 thtnga, visible and invisible, ja divinity iladf."
,., Causally." _ ■"■Not as form, but as univewal rause."
Bo be
It [i;. *.; the infinite]
" " RilBif mi
""Whicli destrojn all tuepoctian
/HO SIR WALTER BALBIGH
versitatis " and " iniiniiatis," a parcel of that which is thc^
universality and the infinity insdf ; and Plato, but a shadowr^
of Gad. But the other to prove the world's eternity, urgetli
this maxim, "that, a sufficient and effectual cause beingf
granted, an answerable eSect thereof is also granted " ;
inferring that God being forever a suiBcicnt and elfectual
cause of the world, the effect of the cause should also
have been forever; to wit, the world universal. But what'
a strange mockery is this in so great a master, to confess
a Gutficient and efTectual cause of the world, (to wit, ati
almighty God) in bis antecedent; and the same God to be'
a God restrained in his conclusion; to make God free
in power, and bound in will: able to effect, unable to de-'
termtue ; able to make all things, and yet unable to make
choice of the time when? For this were impiously to re-
solve of God, as of natural necessity; which hath neither
choice, nor will, nor understanding; which cannot but work
matter being present: as fire, to burn things combustible.
Again he thus disputeth, that every agent which can work,
and doth not work, if it afterward work, it is cither
thereto moved by itself, or by somewhat else: and so
it passelh from power to act. But God (saith he)
is immovable, and is neither moved by himself, nor by
any other: but being always the same, doth always work.
Whence he condudeth, if the world were caused by God,
that he was forever the cause thereof: and therefore eternal.
The answer to this is very easy, for that God's performing
in due time that which he ever determined at length to
perform, doth not argue any alteration or change, but
rather constancy in him. For the same action of his will,
which made the world forever, did also withhold the effect
to the lime ordained. To this answer, in itself sufficient,,
others add further, that the pattern or image of the world
may be said to be eternal: which the Platonics call " spirit-
ualem mundum " ;" and do in this sort distinguish the idea
and creation in time. "Spiritualis ille mundus, mundi huins
"xemplar, primumque Dei opus, vita aequali est architecto,
fuit semper cum illo, eritque semper. Mundus autem cor-
poialis, quod secundum opus est Dei, decedit iam ab opiSce
""Tko ipititnal wOikL"
IflD TRB mSTOBT OT THX VDBU>
^ f^pjiA BdB fxut sdDpcrr iwlmt uttmi^ ^
fKzoBs': "Thu KprcsenUth«. or tl>e 1
I (saj Acf) the sunficr of this viaUe vori^
t vmIe of God, was eqsftSy ancient «iA tbe u^^
r ii was f omtr tritfa bixn, and enr shaQ be. Tlsa
I ■arid, ttw second woric or crcaiare of God, doth
r IbtMi dK vocfccr in titu, ftxi it ms oot from cver^
i in Oift it dodi agree, that it iball be fot tt v r
Tbt fint poiat, dot it m^ not forerer, all
confess: ibe otber they nndentzad do odier-
r Hud tbat after the coosoBntutioii of this «oHd, Umr
■ _bc a new HeaTcn and a cew earth, without any new
*^ ■ of matter. Bat of these thmgs we need itot here
^ ts argBC : tboi^ mdi opinions be oot miwartfa; tbc
~' ~ _ ' I this considenuioa, of an cteraal and m-
I caose, pcod u dng a changeable and Rnponl
Teaming which point Produs the PlatanEst dls-
. dut Ifae com p o un ded essence of the worid (and
e cmpoonded. therefore dissipaUe) is contituied,
[ fcoit to the EHrinc Bnng, by an tDdiridual and in-
t power, Sowing from Divine nnitf; aad tbat tbc
r* natnral appetite of God ibowcth, that the same
from a good and understanding divine; and
' Oais vinue, by which the world fc coniinacd and Itnti
t be infinite, that it may infinitely and eret-
r coatinue and preserre tbc same. AVhich infinite
^^^^ lie finite world (saith he) is not capable of, bat
"*'**»<ah it from the diTioe infinite, according to the lera-
*2| natare it hath, successircly ei-ery moment by little
™? little; even as the whole materia) world is not al-
^*||^*ier: but the abolished parts are departed by small
7^^*^S, and the parts yet to come, do by the same small de-
Jl^^^ sncceed: as the shadow of a tree in a rirer ^emetb
- .***'*e continued tbc same a long time in the »-ater, bat
- '^ perpetually renewed, in the continual ^bing and fiow-
^%^ 'tliereof,
^^^ *»l to renim to them, which denying that erer the
^^ *"'<1 had any beginning, withal deny that ever it shall have
a^^ ^Md. and to this purpose affirm, that it was nCTcr heard,
*r read, never seen, no not by any reason perceived, ■
diet the besvcDs have ever suffered corruptioB; or &at tbcj
•ppesT any way the older by continuance; or in any soft
otherwise than they were; which had lliey been subject W
final corruption, some change would have been discerned
in so long a time. To this it is answered, that the Utile
change as yet perceived, doth rather prove their newness,
and that they have not continued so long; than that they
will continue forever as they are. And if conjectur^
arguments may receive answer by conjectures; it then
aeemeth (hat some alteration may be found. For other
Aristotle, Pliny, Strabo, Bcda, Aquinas, and others, were
grossly mistaken; or else those parts of the world lyil^
within the burnt lone, were not in elder times habitable
by reason of the sun's heat, neither were the seas, under
the equinoctial, navigable. But we know by experience
that those regions, so situate, are filled with people, and
exceeding temperate; and the sea, over which we navigate,
passable enough. We read also many histories of deluges;
and how in the time of Phaeton, divers places in the world
were burnt up, by the sun's violent heat.
But in a word, this observation is exceeding feeble. For
we know it for certain, that stone walls, of matter moulder-
ing and friable, have stood two, or three thousand years;
that many things have been digged up out of the earth,
of that depth, as supposed to have been buried by the gen-
eral flood; without any alteration either of substance or
figure: yea it is believed, and it is very probable, that tiw
gold which is daily found in mines, and rocks,
ground, was created together with the earth.
And if bodies elementary, and compounded, the eldest
times have not invaded and corrupted: what great
teration should we look for in celestial and quint-essential
bodies? And yet we have reason to think, that the sm
by whose help all creatures are generate, doth not in thcM
L latter ages assist nature, as heretofore. We have neitfaei
I pants, such as the eldest world had; nor mighty meOj
Buch as the elder world had; but all things in general are
reputed of less virtue which from the heavens receive virtuf
Whence, if the nature of a preface would permit a larg;et
discourse, we might easily fetch store of proof; as tbat
TO THE HISTOHT OP THE WORUO
world shall at length have end, as that once it had
begioning.
And I see no good answer that can be made to this ob-
jtction ; if the world were eternal, why not all things in
tie world eternal? If there were no first, no cause, no
filter, no creator, no incomprehensible wisdom, but that
Wry nature had been alike eternal; and man more rational
than every other nature : why had not the eternal reason
of man provided for his eternal being in the world? For
if all were equal why not equal conditions to all? Why
iliould heavenly bodies live forever; and the bodies of men
n>t and die?
Again, who was it that appointed the earth to keep
the center, and gave order that it should hang in the air:
fliat the sun should travel between the tropics, and never
'xceed those bounds, nor fail to perform that progress
OBCe in every year: the moon to live by borrowed light:
the fixed stars (according to common opinion) to be fastened
'ike nails in a cartwheel; and the planets to wander at
*ieir pleasure? Or if none of these had power over
other: was it out of charity and love, that the sun by his
perpetual travel within these two circles, hath visited, given
Kght unto, and relieved all parts of the earth, and the
creatures therein, by turns and times? Out of doubt, if
t^c sun have of his own accord kept this course in all
eternity, he may justly be called eternal charity and ever-
'ssting love. The same may be said of all the stars ; who
Deing all of them most large and clear fountains of virtue
3ifi operation, may also, be called eternal virtues: the
earth may be called eternal patience; the moon, an eternal
borrower and beggar; and man of ail other the most mis-
^.•"^-lile, eternally mortal. And what were this, but to be-
J'^Ve again in the old play of the gods? Yea in more gods
"y Tniliions, than ever Hesiodus dreamed of. But instead ■
*** this mad folly, we see it well enough with our feeble
^Qd mortal eyes; and the eyes of our reason discern it
^^tter; that the sun, moon, stars, and the earth, are limited
"•^»»nded, and constrained: themselves they have not con-
"gained nor could. " Omne determinatum causam habet
*Hq_uam efficientem, quae illud determinaverit :" "Every-
HI Kh WALTER RALllC
thing bounded hath some efficient cause, by which !t (l
bounded. "
Now for Nature ; as by the ambigt;itf:y of this name, tht
school of Aristotle hath both commended many errors tinto
us, and sought also thereby to obscure the glory of (he
high moderator of all things, shining in the creation, and
in the governing of the world: so if the best definitlen
be taken out of the second of Aristotle's " Physics," or
*' primo de Coelo," or out of the fifth of his " Met*-
physics " ; I say that the best is but nominal, and serv-
ing only to difference the beginning of natural motion from
artificial ; which yet the Academics open better, when they
call it "a seminary strength, infused into matter by the
soul of the world " : who give the first place to Providence,
the second to Fate, and but the third to Nature. "PtotJ-
dentia" (by which they understand God) "dux et caput;
Fatum, medium ex providentia prodiens; Natura poitre*
mum." ■ But be it what he will, or be it any of these (God
excepted) or participating of all: yet that it hath choice
or understanding (both which are necessarily in the cauK
of all things) no man hath avowed. For this is unanswer-
able of Lactanlius, " Is autem facit aliquid, qui aut volufl-
talem faciendi habet, aut scientiam : " " He only can be
said to be the doer of a thing, that hath cither will or
knowledge in the doing it."
But the will and science of Nature, are in these words
truly expressed by Ficinus : " Potest ubique Natura, vel
per diversa media, vel ex diversis materiis, diversa facerc:
sublata vero medio rum materiatumque diversitate, vel
cum, vel similimum opera tur, nequc potest quando adest
materia non operari " ; " It is the power of Nature by the
diversity of means, or out of diversity of matter, to produce
divers things: but taking away the diversity of means,
and the diversity of matter, it then works but one or the
like work : neither can it but work, matter being present,"
Now if Nature made choice of diversity of matter, to
work all these variable works of heaven and earth, it had
then both understanding and will; it had counsel to begin;
TO THE HISTORY OP TirE WORLD IIS
to dispose; virtue and knowledge to finish, and power
govern: without which all tilings had been but one and
Itie same: ail of the matter of heaven; or all of the matter
of earth, And if we grant Nature this will, and this un-
derstanding, this course, reason, and power; "Cur Na-
tura potius quam Deus nominetur?" "Why should we
Ihen call such a cause rather Nature, than God?" "God,
of whom all men have notion, and ^ive the first and high-
est place to divine power": "Omnes homines notionem
<(ooniin habent, omiiesque summum locum divino cuidam
niuuini assignant," And this I say in short ; that it is a
tm* effect of true reason in man (were there no au-
thority more binding than reason) to acknowledge and
adore the first and most sublime power. "Vera philo-
iophia, est ascensus ab his quae fluunt, et oriuntur, et oc-
cicJunt, ad ea quae vera aunt, et semper eadem": "True
philosophy, is an ascending from the things which flow,
»tid arise, and fall, to the things that are forever the
same."
Tor the rest; I do also account it not the meanest, but
an impiety monstrous, to confound God and Nature; he
it but in terms. For it is God. that only disposeth of all
things according to His own will and tnaketh of one
earth, vessels of honor and dishonor. It is Nature that
can dispose of nothing, but according to the will of the
Matter wherein it worketh. It is God that commandeth
3U; It is Nature that is obedient to all: it is God that doth
ffOod unto all, knowing and loving the good He doth: it
J^ Mature, that secondarily doth also good, but it neither
•"Joweth nor loveth the good it doth. It is God, that hath
^' things in Himself: Nature, nothing in itself. It is
P***i, which is the Father, and hath begotten all things:
', is Nature, which is begotten by all things, in which it
"'eth and laboreth; for by itself it existeth not. For shall
^^ saj, that it is out of affection to the earth, that heavy
thing5 fall towards it? Shall we call it reason, which doth
^nduct every river into the salt sea? Shall we term
^*^ kjiowledge in fire, that makes it to consume combustible
matter? If it be affection, rea.son, and knowledge in these;
^S the same affection, reason, and knowledge it Is, that
SIR WALTER ftALEIGR
Nature vorketh. And therefore seeing all things work as
they do, (call 't by Form, or Nature, or by what you
please) yet because they work by an impulsion, which tiey
cannot resist, or by a faculty, infused by tlie supremest
power; we are neither to wonder at, nor to worship, the
faculty that workcth, nor the creature wherein it worketh.
But herein lies the wonder: and to him is the worship due,
who hath created such a nature in things, and such a faculty,
as neither knowing itself, the matter wherein it worketh,
nor the virtue and power which it hath ; do yet work all
things to their last and uttermost perfection. And there-
fore every reasonable man, taking to himself for a ground
that which is granted by all antiquity, and by all men truly
learned that ever the world had; to wit; that there is a
power infinite, and eternal (which also necessity doth prove
unto us, without the help of faith, and reason; without the
force of authority) all things do as easily follow which
have been delivered by divine letters, as the waters of a
running river do successfully pursue each other from the
first fountains.
This much I say it is, that reason itself hath taught us:
and this is the beginning of knowledge. " Sapientia prae-
cedit, Religio sequitur: quia prius est Deura scire, conse-
quens colere"; "Sapience goes before. Religion follows:
because it is first to know God, and then to worship Him."
This sapience Plato calleth " absoluti boni scientiam," " the
science of the absolute good": and another "scientiam re-
rum primarum, sempiternarum, perpetuarum."" For " faitl]
(saith Isidore) is not extorted by violence; but by reason
and examples persuaded ": " fides nequaqiiam vi extorquetur,
sed ratione et exemplis suadetur." I confess it, that to
inquire further, as to the essence of God, of His power,
of His art, and by what means He created the world: or
of His secret judgment, and the causes, is not an eEEect
of reason. " Sed cum ratione insaniunt," but " they grow
mad with reason," that inquire after it. For as it is no
shame, nor dishonor (saith a French author) "de faire
arrest au but qu'on nasceu surpasser," " tor a man to
I reat himself there where he finds it impossible to pass on
■* " The leieiice of thlags &tM, clEtnal. perpetual.''
TO THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD
fiiither": so whatsoever is beyond, and out of the reach
of true reason, it acknowledgeth it to be so; as under-
sianding iiself not to be infinite, but according to the
name and nature it hath, to be a teacher, that best knows
the end of his own art. For seeing both reason and neces-
sity teach us (reason, which is "pars divini spiritus in
corpus humanum mersi"") that the world was made by
a power infinite; and yet how it was made, it cannot teach
ns; and seeing the same reason and necessity make us
laiow, that the same infinite power is everywhere in the
World; and yet how everywhere, it cannot inform us: our
belief hereof is not weakened, but greatly strengthened,
by our ignorance, because it is the same reason that tells
us, that such a nature cannot be said to be God, that can
be in all conceived by man.
I have already been over-long, to make any large dis-
course either of the parts of the following story, or in
Mine own excuse: especially in the excuse of this or that
passage; seeing the whole is exceeding weak and defec-
tive. Among the grossest, the unsuitable division of the
books, I could not know how lo excuse, had I not been
directed to enlarge the building after the foundation was
laid, and the first part finished. All men know that there
is no great art in the dividing evenly of these things,
which are subject to number and measure. For the rest,
it suits well enough with a great many books of this age,
which speak too much, and yet say little; "Ipsi nobis
farto subducimur"; " We are stolen away from ourselves,"
setting a high price on all that is our own. But hereof,
though a late good writer make complaint, yet shall it not
lay hold on me. because I believe as he doth; that who
so thinks himself the wisest man, is but a poor and mis-
erable ignorant. Those that are the best men of war against
"" the vanities and fooleries of the world, do always keep
"le strongest guards against themselves, to defend them
'""oin themselves; from self-love, self-estimation, and se!f-
"P'nion.
*^«nerally concerning the order of the work. I have only
"*^ d a counsel from the argument. For of the Assyrians,
*■ " Fart of tbe divine spirit iaunermj in the human body."
nR WALTER RALEIGH
which after th« downfall of Babel take up the first pUt,
and were the fint great kings of the world, there came little
to the view of posterity: some few enterprises, greater la
fame than faith, of Ninus and Semiramis, excepted.
It was the story of the Hebrews, of all before the OJyi
piads. that overcame the consuming disease of time, and
preserved itself, from the very cradle and beginning to this
day: and yet not so entire, but that the large discoursei
thereof (to which in many Scriptures we arc referred) arC
nowhere found. The fragments of other stories, "tfith ibt
actions of those kings and princes which shot up here and
there in the same time, I am driven to relate by way of
digression : of which we may say with Virgil : " Apparent
rari names in gurgite vaato " ; " They appear here and thcr*
floating in the great gulf of time."
To the same first ages do belong the report of many inven-
tions therein found, and from them derived to us; though
most of the authors' names have perished in so long a navi-
gation. For those ages had their laws; they had diversity
of government; they had kingly rule; nobility: policy in
war; navigation, and all, or the most of needful trades. Ttt
speak therefore of these (seeing in a general history wt
diould have left a great deal of nakedness, by their omis-
sion) it cannot properly be called a digression. True I(
is, that I have made also many others: which if they shall
be laid to my charge. I must cast the fault into the great
heap of human error. For seeing we digress in all thA
ways of our lives; yea, seeing the life of man is nothing eiss
but digression; I may the better be excused, in writing thetf
lives and actions. I am not altogether ignorant in the
of history and of the kinds.
The same hatii been taught by many, but no man better,
and with greater brevity, than by that excellent leametf.
gentleman. Sir Francis Bacon. Christian laws are also
taught us by the prophets and apostles ; and every da/"
preached unto us. But we still make large digressions: yca^
the teachers themselves do not (in all) keep the path which'
they point out to others.
For the rest, after such time as the Persians had wrested
the Empire from the Chaldeans, and had raised a great
TO THE HISTORY OP THE WORLD
lie
monarchy, producing actions of more importance than were
eisewhere to be found; it was agreeable to the order of the
story, to attend this Empire; whilst it so flouriEhed, that the
■ffairs of the nations adjoining had reference thereunto.
Tile like observance was to be used towards the fortunes of
GrcKe, when they again began to get ground upon the
Persians; as also towards the affairs of Rome, when tlie
Rotnans grew more mighty than the Greeks.
.As for the Medes, the Macedonians, the Sicilians, the
Carlhaginians, and other nations who resisted the beginnings
of the former empires, and afterwards became but partg
of their composition and enlargement; it seemed best to
rexnember what was known of them from their several be-
girinbgs. In such times and places as they in their flourish-
ing estates opposed those monarchies, which in the end
K'W^allowed them up. And herein I have followed the best
Biographers ; who seldom give names to those small brooks,
w^hereof many, joined together, make great rivers: till such
times as they become united, and run in main stream to the
ocean sea. If the phrase be weak, and the style not every-
where like itself: the first shows their legitimation and true
parent; the second will excuse itself upon the variety of mat-
tcr. For Virgil, who wrote his Eclogues, " gracili avens,'"*
«Scd stronger pipes, when he sounded the wars of Aeneas.
It may also be laid to my charge, that I use divers Hebrew
W^rds in my first book, and elsewhere : in which language
others may think and I myself acknowledge it, that I am
altogether ignorant: but it is true, that some of them I find
■n Montanus, others in Latin characters in S. Senensis;
^'^d of the rest I have borrowed the interpretation of some
*** my friends. But say I had been beholding to neither, yet
J ^rc it not to be wondered at, having had an eleven years'
eisure, to attain the knowledge of that, or of any other
Onguc ; howsoever, I know that it will be said by many, that
"light have been more pleasing to the reader, if I had
*^tten the story of mine own times, having been permitted
^ draw water as near the well-head as another. To this
answer, that whosoever in writing a modern history, shall
oUow truth too near the heels, it may haply strike out his
•■ ■■ With delicite pipe."
[20
STR WALTER RALEIGH
teeth. There is no mistress or guide, that hath led 1
followers and servants into greater miseries. He that gl
after her too far off, ioseth her sight, and loseth himsa
and he that walks after her at a middle distance: I know d
whether I should call that kind of course, temper," or bn
ncss. It is true, that I never travelled after men's opinitM
when I might have made the best use of them: and I ha
now too few days remaining, to imitate those, that eia
out of extreme ambition, or of extreme cowardice, or txl
do yet (when death hath them on his shoulders) flatter f
world, between the bed and the grave. It is enough I
me (being in that slate I am) to write of the eldest tinH
wherein also why may it not be said, that in speaking of 1
past, I point at (he present, and tax the vices of those n
arc yet living, in their persons that are long since dead; ■
have it laid to my charge? But this I cannot help, thotl
innocent. And certainly, if there be any, that finding ^m
selves spotted like the tigers of old time, shall find fault in
me for painting them over anew, they shall therein acel
themselves jusdy, and me falsely. |
For I protest before the Majesty of God, that I malicel
man under the sun. Impossible I know it is to plerse ■
seeing few or none are so pleased with themselves, or]
assured of themselves, by reason of their subjection to tn
private passions, but that they seem divers persons in a
and the same day. Seneca hath said it, and so do I : " Ui
mihi pro populo erat";" and to the same effect Epicun
"Hoc ego non multis sed tibi " ;" or (as it hath since lamM
ably fallen out) I may borrow the resolution of an ancb
philosopher, "Satis est unus, satis est nulius."" For it ^
for the service of that inestimable Prince Henry, the ;
cessive hope, and one of the greatest of the Oiristian n
that I undertook this work. It pleased him to peruse s
part thereof, and to pardon what was amiss. It is now l{
to the world without a master: from which all that is j
sented, hath received both blows and thanks: " Ea<j^
probamus, eadera reprehendimus : hie exitus est
" Modcralion.
""I {have don
•• " One 1e cnou
"To n
TO THE HISTORY OP THE WOBLD 121
judicii, in quolis secundum plures datur."*' But these dis-
courses are idle. I know that as the charitable will judge
charitably: so against those, "Qui gloriantur in malitia/***
my present adversity hath disarmed me. I am on the grotmd
already, and therefore have not far to fall: and for rising
again, as in the natural privation there is no recession to
habit; so it is seldom seen in the privation politic. I do
therefore forbear to style my readers gentle, courteous, and
friendly, thereby to beg their good opinions, or to promise
a second and third volume (which I also intend) if the
first receive grace and good acceptance. . For that which is
already done, may be thought enough, and too much : and it
is certam, let us claw the reader with never so many
courteous phrases, yet shall we evermore be thought fools,
that write foolishly. For conclusion, all the hope I have lies
in this, that I have already found more tmgentle and un-
courteous readers of my love towards them, and well-
deserving of them, than ever I shall do again. For had it
been otherwise, I should hardly have had this leisure, to have
made myself a fool in print.
iJHZ^^ approve the same thinffs, we blame the same thiiiffs: this isthere^
™ « w£[^J*'^ *F ^^^9.^ % verdict it rendered accordinc to the majority."
Who glory in matiee."
' PROCEMIUM, EPISTLE
DEDICATORY, PREFACE,
AND PLAN OF THE INSTAURATi
MAGNA, ETC.
BY FRANCIS BACON
FRANCIS OF VERULAM REASONED THUS WlT*
HIMSELF,
I Amd Judged it to be rot the Ikteeest op the Prbsk***
AND Future Generations That Thev Should ^W*
Made Acquainted wtth His Thougbte
BEING convinced that the human intellect makes > '^^
own difficulties, not using the true helps which a» _ ^
at man's disposal soberly and judiciously; wheo^— ^
follows manifold ignorance of things, and by reason of tb:
ignorance mischiefs innumerable; he thought all trial shoi
be made, whether that commerce between the mind of
and the nature of things, which is more precious than an;
thing on earth, or at least than anything that is of the
might by any means be restored to its perfect and origio=
I condition, or if that may not be, yet reduced to a better co—
dition than that in which it now is. Now that the erro^
which have hitherto prevailed, and which will prevail fo-
ever, should (if the mind be left to go its own way), eith ■
by the natural force of the understanding or by help ^
; Harya
I be found
daisies.
■It hy which
s tchcoie 11
sf-
n, wai Mt far tr-
Pt}f oil which It "
! typical both of
INSTAUBATIO MAGNA
the aids and instruments of Logic, one by one correct them-
selves, wae a thing not to be hoped for: because the primary
notions of things which the mind readily and passively
imbibes, stores up. and accumulates (and it is from them that
all the rest flow) are false, confused, and overhastity ab-
stracted from the facts; nor are the secondary and sub-
sequent notions less arbitrary and inconstant; whence it
follows that the entire fabric of human reason which we
employ in the inquisition of nature, is badly put together
and built up, and like some magnificent structure witliout
Uiy foundation. For while men are occupied in admiring
and applauding the false powers of the mind, they pass by
and throw away those true powers, which, if it be sup-
plied with the proper aids and can itself be content to wait
I npon nature instead of vainly affecting to overrule her,
are within its reach. There was but one course left, there-
lore, — to try the whole thing anew upon a better plan, and
I to commence a total reconstruction of sciences, arts, and all
human knowledge, raised upon the proper foundations. And
this, though in the project and undertaking it may seem a
thing infinite and beyond the powers of maji, yet when it
comes to be dealt with it will be found sound and sober,
wore so than what has been done hitherto. For of this there
IS aome issue; whereas in what is now done in the matter of
^t'Dce there is only a whirling round about, and perpetual
^'tation, ending where it began. And although he was well
3ware how solitary an enterprise it is, and how hard a thing
*o Win faith and credit for, nevertheless he was resolved not
Jo abandon either it or himself ; nor to be deterred from try-
""e and entering upon that one path which is alone open to
'he human mind. For better it is to make a beginning of
*hat which may lead to something, than to engage in a per-
P^Hial struggle and pursuit in courses which have no exit.
"^^d certainly the two ways of contemplation are much like
"^Ose two ways of action, so much celebrated, in this — that
J'^C one, arduous and difficult in the beginning. leads out at
*st. into the open country; while the other, seeming at first
®*eht easy and free from obstruction, leads to pathless and
**''ecipilous places.
"" "toreover, because be knew not how long it might be
FRANCIS BACON
■uld (
r to any one else, judgr"
. that he has found no man hitherto r^
d to the like, he resolved to publish
'. has been able to complete. The ca^
not ambition for himself, but solidtu-
case of his death there might r
before these tilings v
especially from this, 1
has applied his mil
once so much as h
of which haste was
for the work; that
some outline and project of that which he had conceiv ■•
and some evidence likewise of his honest mind and incli^r-«
lion towards the benefit of the human race. Certain it
that all other ambition whatsoever seemed poor in his e^-*^
compared with the work which he had in hand; seeing tE-»
the matter at issue is either nothing, or a thing so great t^-» -
it may well be content with its own merit, without seek"
other recompeace.
^
^^,
EPISTLE DEDICATORY
" TO THE INSTAURATIO MAGNA.
Xo ouK Most Gracious and Mighty Prince and Lord
JAMES
BY THE GRACE OF GOD
GREAT BRITAIN, FRANCE AND IRELAND
KING, DEFENDER OF THE FAITH, ETC.
■** cj( Gracious and Mighty King,
^^T'OUR Majesty may periiaps accuse me of larceny, hav-
^/ ing stolen from your affairs so much time as was re-
~ * quired for this work. I know not what to say for
ttiyself. For of tirae there can be no restitution, unless it be
that what has been abstracted from your business may per-
haps go to the memory of your name and the honour of your
age; if these things are indeed worth anything. Certainly
th^y are quite new; totally new in their very kind: and yet
tliey are copied from a very ancient model ; even the world it-
Self sind the nature of things and of the mind. And to say
tnjth, I am wont for my own part to regard this work as a
child of time rather than of wit ; the only wonder being that
the first notion of the thing, and such great suspicions con-
cerning matters long established, should have come into any
man's mind. All the rest follows readily enough. And no
doubt there Is something of accident (as we call it) and luck
as well in what men think as in what they do or say. But for
this accident which I speak of, I wish that if there be any
good in what I have to offer, it may be ascribed to the infinite
mercy and goodness of God, and to the felicity of your
Majesty's times; lo which as I have been an honest and
aff«tionate servant in my life, so after my death I may yet
perhaps, through the kindling of this new light in the dark-
of philosophy, be the means of making this age famous
226 FRANCIS BACON
to posterity; and surely to the times of the wisest and most
learned of kings belongs of right the regeneration and res-
toration of the sciences. Lastly, I have a request to make—
a request no way unworthy of your Majesty, and which
especially concerns the work in hand; namely, tbat you who
resemble Solomon in so many things — in the gravity of your
judgments, in the peacefitiness of your reign, in the largeness
of your heart, in the noble variety of the books which you
have composed — would further follow his example in taldng
order for the collecting and perfecting of a Natural and
Experimental History, true and severe (unincumbered with
literature and book-learning), such as philosophy may be
built upon, — such, in fact, as I shall in its proper place
describe : that so at length, after the lapse of so many ages,
philosophy and the sciences may no longer float in air, bat
rest on the solid foundation of experience of every kind,
and the same well examined and weighed. I have provided
the machine, but the stuff must be gathered from the facts of
nature. May God Almighty long preserve your Majesty!
Your Majesty's
Most bounden and devoted Servant,
Francis Verulam,
Chancellor*
TO THE INSTAURATIO MAGNA
'hat the state of knowledge is not prosperous nor greatiy
advancing; and that a way twist be opened for the hu~
man understanding entirely different from any hitherto
known, and other helps provided, in order that the mind
may exercise over the nature of things the anlhority
which properly belongs to it.
r SEEMS to me that men do not rightly understand
either their store or their strength, but overrate the one
and underrate the other. Hence it follows, that either
from an extravagant estimate of the value of the arts which
they poseess, they seek no further ; or else from too mean an
estimate of their own powers, they spend their strength in
small matters and never put it fairly to the trial in those
iwhich go to the main. These are as the pillars of fate set
in the path of knowledge; for men have neither desire nor
hope to encourage them to penetrate further. And since
opinion of store is one of the chief causes of want, and sat-
isfaction with the present induces neglect of provision for
the future, it becomes a thing not only useful, but absolutely
nectssary, that the excess of honour and admiration with
which onr existing stock of inventions is regarded be in
the Very entrance and threshold of the work, and that frankly
^^ without circumlocution, stripped off, and men be duly
Warned not to exaggerate or make too much of them. For
'^t a man look carefully into all that variety of books with
*Wch the arts and sciences abound, he will find everywhere
^dless repetitions of the same thing, varying in the method
of treatment, but not new in substance, insomuch that the
*hoIe stock, numerous as it appears at 6rst view, proves on
^'^^tnination to be but scanty. And for its value and utility
" Qiii^t be plainly avowed tliat that wisdom which we have
FRANCIS BACON
derived principally from the Greeks is but like the boybi
of knowledge, and has the characteristic property of boys
it can talk, but it cannot generate; for it is fruitful of contro-
I versies but barren of works. So that the state of learning
as it now is appears to be represented to the life in the olc
fable of Scylla, who had the head and face of a virgin, bui
her womb was hung round with barking monsters,
which she could not be delivered. For in like mann
sciences lo which we are accustomed have certain genei
positions which are specious and flattering; but as soon as
they come to particulars, which are as the parts of genera-
tion, when they should produce fruit and works, then arise
contentions and barking disputations, which are the end oi
the matter and all the issue they can yield. Observe also, thai
if sciences of this kind had any life in them, that cotilf^B^H
never have come to pass which has been the case now fot—'^^H
many ages — that they stand almost at a stay, without receiv — —^M
ing any augmentations worthy of the human race; insomuch -^^
that many times not only what was asserted once is asserted-^Bl
still, but what was a question once is a question still, and_^E
instead of being resolved by discussion is only fixed and-^EJ
fed; and all the tradition and succession of schools is still -•^-'
a succession of masters and scholars, not of inventors and-t-W
those who bring to further perfection the things invented. — *■
In the mechanical arts we do not find it so; they, on the^^-* ^
contrary, as having in them some breadi of life, are con *"
tinually growing and becoming more perfect As originally -">iC 1
invented they are commonly rude, clumsy, and shapeless;.^ ■*
afterwards they acquire new powers and more commodious^s -■
arrangements and constructions; in so far that men shallX-^'
sooner leave the study and pursuit of them and turn to*::^-'
something else, than they arrive at the ultimate perfcctioo.«:^«''
of which they are capable. Philosophy and the intellectual .^-^
sciences, on the contrary, stand like statues, worshiped aniK-*--*
celebrated, but not moved or advanced. Nay, they som*-^-^
times flourish most in the hands of the first author. and.K-»<
afterwards degenerate. For when men have once made over -— ^
their judgments to others' keeping, and (like those senators . g=^^
whom they called Pedarii) have agreed to support some onL- m*
person's opinion, from that time they make no enlargement^^*
^ i
of the sciences themselves, but fail to the servile office of
onhdlishing certain individual authors and increasing their
retinue. And let it not be said that the sciences have been
growing gradually till ihey have at last reached their full
stature, and so (their course being completed) have settled
■n the works of a few writers; and that there being now no
room for the invention of better, all that remains is to em-
"•cllish and cultivate those things which have been invented
already. Would it were so ! But the truth is that this appro-
priating of the sciences has its origin in nothing better than
the confidence of a few persons and the sloth and indolence
"f the rest. For after the sciences had been in several parts
Perhaps cultivated and handled diligently, there has risen
^P some man of bold disposition, and famous for methods
*"<i short ways which people like, who has in appearance
'"Cduced them to an art, while he has in fact only spoiled all
J^t the others had done. And yet this is what posterity
'ilce, because it makes the work short and easy, and saves
'"Jrther inquiry, of which they are weary and impatient.
And if any one take this general acquiescence and consent
*Of an argument of weight, as being the judgment of Time,
^et me tell him that the reasoning on which he relies is most
fallacious and weak. For, first, we are far from knowing all
•Jiat in the matter of sciences and arts has in various ages
^*d places been brought to light and published ; much less,
^I that has been by private persons secretly attempted and
Stirred; so neither the births nor the miscarriages of Time
*lre entered in our records. Nor, secondly, is the consent
Itself and the lime it has continued a consideration of much
"Worth. For however various are the forms of civil politics,
there is but one form of polity in the sciences; and that
always has been and always will be popular. Now the
doctrines which find most favour with the populace are
Chose which are either contentious and pugnacious, or
specious and empty; such, I say, as either entangle assent
or tickle it. And therefore no doubt the greatest wits in
each successive age have been forced out of their own
course; men of capacity and intellect above the vulgar hav-
ing been fain, for reputation's sake, to bow to the judgment
of th e time and the multitude; and thus if any contempla-
te) HC~Vol.8B
FRANCIS BAOON
J
Hon* of a higher order took light anywhere, they wee-
presently blown out by the winds of vulgar opinions. &■ -o
that Time is like a river, which has brought down to t^^^s
things light and puffed up, while those which are weights y
and solid have sunk. Nay, those very authors who hai^*^*^
usurped a kind of dictatorship in the sciences and taken up<^ **
them to lay down the law with such confidence, yet whe= "«*■
from time to lime they come to themselves again, they fa ^^1
to complaints of the subtlety of nature, the hiding-plac
of truth, the obscurity of things, the entanglement of causes
the weakness of the human mind: wherein nevertheless the_
show themselves never the more modest, seeing that Xhr ■
will rather lay the blame upon the common condition o—
man and nature than upon themselves. And then whateve
any art fails to attain, they ever set it down upon the auj
thority of (hat art itself as impossible of attainment;
how can art be found guilty when it is judge in its '
cause? So it is but a device for exempting ignorance fron:
ignominy. Now for those things which are delivered ancJ.^ -
received, this is their condition: barren of works, full or ^
questions; in point o£ enlargement slow and languid; carry— ^^i
ing a show of perfection in the whole, but in the parts ill -^-
flUed up; in selection popular, and unsatisfactory even tc;^—
those who propound them; and therefore fenced round an£i*'^
set forth with sundry artifices. And if there be any whc^:* ^
have determined to make trial for themselves, and put theirs -■
own strength to the work of advancing the boundaries o^t ■*
the sciences, yet have they not ventured to cast themselve^s ^
completely loose from received opinions or to seek theirs *
knowledge at the fountain ; but they think they have done^^-*
some great thing if they do hut add and introduce into the^ '
existing sum of science something of their own; prudently-
considering with themselves that by making the additioiu
they can assert their liberty, while they retain the credit of^^ *
modesty by assenting to the rest. But these mediocrities^^ "*
ahd middle ways so much praised, in deferring to opinions-^^^^
and customs, turn to the great detriment of the sciences.-—- ■ '^
For it is hardly possible at once to admire an author and tO'^^^^^
go beyond him; knowledge being as water, which will not_^
rise above the level from which it fell Men of this 1 '
Irind. ■ M
mSTAURATIO MAGNA
m therefore, amend some things, but advance little; and iin-
'9 prove the condition of knowledge, but do not extend its
fsnge. Some, indeed, there have been who have gone more
boldly to work, and taking it all for an open matter and
giving their genius full play, have made a passage for them-
selves and their own opinions by pulling down and demolish-
ing former ones; and yet all their stir has but little ad-
vanced the matter; since their aim has been not to extend
philosophy and the arts in substance and value, but only to
change doctrines and transfer the kingdom of opinions to
themselves ; whereby little has indeed been gained, for
though the error be the opposite of the other, the causes
of erring are the same in both. And if there have been
^ny who, not binding themselves either to other men's opin-
ions or to their own, but loving liberty, have desired to en-
Sage others along with themselves in search, these, though
"Ouest in intention, have been weak in endeavour. For they
**ave been content to follow probable reasons, and are car-
']i's<3 round in a whirl of arguments, and in the promiscuous
ilberty of search have relaxed the severity of inquiry. There
'® none who has dwelt upon experience and the facts of
5**tnrc as long as is necessary. Some there are indeed who
^Ve committed themselves to the waves of experience, and
'^'*tiost turned mechanics; yet these again have in their very
'^periments pursued a kind of wandering inquiry, with-
j_^^l any regular system of operations. And besides they
*^^ve mostly proposed to themselves certain petty tasks,
dicing it for a great matter to work out some single dis-
^^very ; — a course of proceeding at once poor in aim and
l***ski!£ul in design. For no man can rightly and successfully
J'lvesttgate the nature of anything in the thing itself; let
**iin vary bis experiments as lahoriously as he will, he never
^omes to a resting-place, but still finds something to seek
■ieyond. And there is another thing to be remembered;
lamely, that all industry in experimenting has begun with
Proposing to itself certain deSnile works to be accom-
plished, and has pursued them with premature and unsea-
sonable eagerness; it has sought, I say, experiments of
t'ruit, not experiments of Light; not imitating the divine
procedure, which in its first day's work created liglit only
and assi^ed to it one entire day ; on which day it produced
L no material work, but proceeded to that on the dajrs follow-
As for those who have given ihe 6rst place to Logic,
supposing that the surest helps to the sciences were to be
found in that, they have indeed most truly and excellently
perceived that the human intellect left to its own course
is not to be trusted; but then the remedy is altogether too
weak for the disease; nor is it without evil in itself. For
the Logic which is received, though it be very properly ap-
plied to civil business and to those arts which rest in dis-
course and opinion, is not nearly subtle enough to deal with
nature ; and in offering at what it cannot master, has done
more to establish and perpetuate error than to open the
way to truth.
Upon the whole therefore, it seems that men have not
been happy hitherto either in the trust which they have
placed in others or in their own industry with regard to
the sciences; especially as neither the demonstrations nor
the experiments as yet known are much to be relied upon.
But the universe to the eye of the human understanding is
framed like a labyrinth ; presenting as it does on every side
so many ambiguities of way, such deceitful resemblances
of objects and signs, natures so irregular in their lines, and
so knotted and entangled. And then the way is still to tie
made by the uncertain light of the sense, sometimes shining
out, sometimes clouded over, through the woods of experi-
ence and particulars; while those who offer themselves for
guides are (as was said) themselves also puzzled, and in-
crease the number of errors and wanderers. In circum-
stances so difficult neither the natural force of man's judg-
ment nor even any accidental felicity offers any chance of
success. No excellence of wit, no repetition of chance ex-
periments, can overcome such difficulties as these. Our
steps must be guided by a clue, and the whole way from
the very first perception of the senses must be laid out npoa
a sure plan. Not that I would be understood to mean tfiat
nothing whatever has been done in so many ages by so
great labours. We have no reason to be ashamed of the
discoveries which have been made, and no doubt the ancients
proved themselves in everything that turns on wit aadi
INSTAURATIO MAGNA
abstract meditation, wonderful men. But as in former
ages when men sailed only by observation of the stars, they
could indeed coast along the shores of the old continent or
cross a few small and mediterranean seas; but before the
ocean could be traversed and the new world discovered,
the use of the mariner's needle, as a more faithful and
certain guide, had to be found out; in like manner the
discoveries which have been hitherto made in the arts and
sciences are such as might be made by practice, medita-
tion, observation, argumentation, — for they lay near to the
senses, and immediately beneath common notions; but be-
fore we can reach the remoter and more hidden parts of
nature, it is necessary that a more perfect use and applica-
tion of the human mind and intellect be introduced.
For my own part at least, in obedience to the everlasting
love of truth, I have committed myself to the uncertainties
and difficulties and solitudes of the ways, and relying on the
divine assistance have upheld my mind both against the shocks
and embattled ranks of opinion, and against my own private
and inward hesitations and scruples, and against the fogs
and clouds of nature, and the phantoms flitting about on every
side; in the hope of providing at last for the present and
future generations guidance more faithful and secure.
Wherein if I have made any progress, the way has been
opened to roe by no other means than the true and legitimate
humiliation of the human spirit. For all those who before me
have applied themselves to the invention of arts have but
cast a glance or two upon facts and examples and experience,
and straightway proceeded, as if invention were nothing
more than an exercise of thought, to invoke their own spirits
to give them oracles. I, on the contrary, dwelling purely
and constantly among the facts of nature, withdraw ray
intellect from them no furtlier than may suffice to let the
images and rays of natural objects meet in a point, as they
do in the sense of vision; whence it follows that the strength
and excellency of the wit has but little to do in the matter.
And the same humility which I use in inventing I employ
likewise in teaching. For I do not endeavour either by
triumphs of confutation, or pleadings of antiquity, or as-
isdon of authority, or even by the veil of obscurity, to
I
IM FBAN'CIS BACON
nrrest these inventions of mine with any majesty; whidi
might easily be done by one who sought to give lustre to hii
own name rather than hght to other men's minds. I bavflt
not sought (I say) nor do 1 seek eilher to force or ensnai
men's judgments, but I lead them to things themselves ar
the concordances of tilings, that they may see for themsclvei
what they have, what they can dispute, what they can add
and contribute to the common stock. And for myself, if ia>
anything I have been eilher too credulous or too little awal
and attentive, or if I have fallen off by the way and left
the inquiry incomplete, nevertJieless I so present these thingt
naked and open, that my errors can be marked and set asidf
before the mass of knowledge be further infected by thetn;
and it will be easy also for others to continue and carry os
my labours. And by these means I suppose that I havi
cBtablished for ever a true and lawful marriage betwewi '
empirical and tlie rational faculty, the unkind and
■tarred divorce and separation of which has thrown into
fusion all the afFairs of the human family.
Wherefore, seeing that these things do not dqjcnd upon
myself, at the outset of the work I most humbly and fer-
vently pray to God the Father, God the Son, and God the
Holy Ghost, that remembering the sorrows of mankind and
the pilgrimage of this our life wherein we wear out days
few and evil, they will vouchsafe through my hands to endow
the human family with new mercies. This likewise I humbly
pray, that things human may not interfere with things divine,
and that from the opening of the ways of sense and the
increase of natural light there may arise in our minds no
increduhty or darkness with regard to the divine mysteries;
but rather that the understanding being thereby purified
and purged of fancies and vanity, and yet not the less sub-
ject and entirely submissive to the divine oracles, may give
to faith that which is faith's. Lastly, that knowledge being
now discharged of that venom which the serpent infused
into it, and which makes the mind of man to swell, we may
not be wise above measure and sobriety, but cultivate truth
in charity.
And now having said my prayers I turn to men ; to whom
I have certain salutarj- admonitions to offer and certain
INSTAURATIO MAGNA 135
liit requests to make. My first admonition (which was also
my prayer) is that men confine the sense within the limits
of daty in respect to things divine : for the sense is like the
sun. which reveals the face of earth, hut seals and shuts
up the face of heaven. My next, that in flying from this evil
they fall not into the opposite error, which they will surely
Ai if they think that the inquisition of nature is in any pari
interdicted or forbidden. For it was not that pure and un-
corrupted natural knowledge whereby Adam gave names to
"■c creatures according to their propriety, which gave occasion
to the fall. It was the ambitious and proud desire of moral
"Qwledgc to judge of good and evil, to the end that man may
'cvoli from God and give laws to himself, which was the
'ortn and manner of the temptation. Whereas of the sciences
*''ich regard nature, the divine philosopher declares 'hat
*t is the glory of God to conceal a thing, but it is the glory
"f the King to find a thing out." Even as though the divine
"^tiire took pleasure in the innocent and kindly sport of
^^ildren playing at hide and seek, and vouchsafed of his
****dneEs and goodness to admit the human spirit for his play-
*^llow at that game. Lastly, I would address one general ad-
monition to all ; that they consider what are the true ends of
**J<3wiedge, and that they seek it not cither for pleasure of the
^*«id, or for contention, or for superiority to others, or for
^•■^fit, or fame, or power, or any of these inferior things; bnt
**^T the benefit and use of life : and that they perfect and gov-
^*^ it in charity. For it was from lust of power that the
^*5gels fell, from lust of knowledge that man fell; but of
^Harity there can be no excess, neither did angel or man ever
^Ome in danger by it.
The requests I have to make are these. Of myself I say
'Nothing; but in behalf of the business which is in hand I
Entreat men to believe that it is not an opinion to be held,
tut a work to be done; and to be well assured that I am
•abouring to lay the foundation, not of any sect or doctrine,
but of human utility and power. Next, I ask f'lera to deal
fairly by their own interests, and laying aside all emulations
and prejudices in favour of this or that opinion, to join in
consultation for the common good; and being now freed
and guarded by the securities and helps which I offer from
136 FRANCIS BAOOir
the errors and impedimciits of the wmy, to
fhemselTCS and take part in that which remains to be done.
Moreover, to be of good hope, nor to imagine •*— t dni
Instauration of mine is a thing infinite and beyond iM
power of man, when it is in fact the true end and tcni-
nation of infinite error; and seeing also that it Is bjr as
means forgetfnl of the conditions of mortality and t mt u uuhj
(for it does not suppose that the work can be alto-
gether completed within one generation, bnt proii d cs for ii
being taken np by another) ; and finally that it acds for tk
sciences not arrogantly in the little cells of bnman wit, kt
with reverence in the greater world. But it is the cnp^
things that are vast: things solid are most wwifra c lfd arf
lie in little room. And now I have only one fxnm.
more to ask (else injustice to me may perhaps in^cifl Ae
business itself) — that men will consider well how for, npos
that which I must needs assert (if I am to be
with myself), they are entitled to judge and d
these doctrines of mine; inasmuch as all ihat
human reasoning which anticipates inquiry, and Is
from the facts rashly and sooner than is fit, is by
jected (so far as the inquisition of nature is oonc
as a thing uncertain, confused, and iH built np; and I
not be fairly asked to abide Iff the decision of a "
which is itself on its trial
THE PLAN OF THE INSTAURATIO MAGNA
The work is io six Parts; —
i- The Divisions of the Sciences.
3- The New Organon; or Directions concemtHg the
Interpretation of Nature.
3- The Phenomena of the Universe; or a Natural and
Experimental History for the foundation of
Philosophy.
4- The Ladder of the Intellect.
5- The Forerunners; or Anticipations of the New
Philosophy.
The New Philosophy; or Active Science,
The Arguments of the several Parts.
-f It being part of my design to set everytiiing forth, as
^^-^ as may be, plainly and perspicuously (for nakedness of
^^^ mind is still, as nakedness of the body once was, the
j^^'mpanion of innocence and simplicity), let me first ex-
_^^Sin the order and plan of the work. I distribute it into
*:s( parts.
The first part exhibits a summary or general description
^^ r the knowledge which the human race at present pos-
^sses. For I thought it good to make some pause upon that
^'^'■hich is received; that thereby the old may be more easily
?*iade perfect and the new more easily approached. And I
*~»oId the improvement of that which we have to be as much an
'^tject as the acquisition of more. Besides which it will
**iake me the better listened to; for "He that is ignorant
<[says the proverb) receives not the words of knowledge,
lanless thou first tell him that which is in his own heart"
We will therefore make a coasting voyage along the shores
of the arts and sciences received; not without importing
into them some useful things by the way.
1^
'tX FRANCIS BACON
In laying out the divisions of ihe sciences however, I
take into account not only things already invented and
known, but likewise things omitted which ought to be
there. For there are found in the intellectual as in the
terrestial globe waste regions as well as cultivated ones,
It is no wonder therefore if I am sometimes obliged to
depart from the ordinary divisions. For in adding to the
total you necessarily alter the parts and sections; and the
received divisions of the sciences are fitted only to the
received sum of them as it stands now.
With regard to those things which I shall mark down
as omitted, I intend not merely to set down a simple title
or a concise argument of that which is wanted. For as
often as I have occasion to report anything as deficient, the
nature of which is at all obscure, so that men may not
perhaps easily understand what I mean or what the work
is which I have in my head, I shall always (provided it be
a matter of any worth) take care to subjoin either direc-
tions for the execution of such work, or else a portion of the
work itself executed by myself as a sample of the whole : thus
giving assistance in every case either by work or by coun-
sel. For if it were for the sake of my reputation only
uid other men's interests were not concerned in it, I would
not have any man think that in such cases merely some
light and vague notion has crossed my mind, and that the
things which I desire and offer at are no better than wishes;
when they are in fact things which men may certainly com-
mand if they will, and of which I have formed in my own
mind a clear and detailed conception. For I do not pro-
pose merely to survey these regions in my mind, like an augur
taking auspices, but to enter them like a general who means
to take possession. — So much for the first part of the work.
Having thus coasted past the ancient arts, the next pomt.
is to equip the intellect for passing beyond. To the second,
part therefore belongs the doctrine concerning the betted'
and more perfect use of human reason in the inquisition of.
things, and the true helps of the understanding: that thereby,
(as far as the condition of mortality and humanity allows)
the intellect may be raised and exalted, and made capable
of overcoming the difficulties and obscurities of nature.
The art which I introduce with this view (which I call
Interpretation of Nature) is a kind of logic; though the
difference between it and the ordinary logic is great; in-
deed immense. For the ordinary logic professes to contrive
and prepare helps and guards for the imder standing, as
mine docs ; and in this one point they agree. But mine differs
from it in three points especially; viz. in the end aimed at;
in the order of demonstration; and in the starting point
of the inquiry.
For the end which this science of mine proposes is the in-
vention not of arguments but of arts; not of things in ac-
cordance with principles, but of principles themselves; not
of probable reasons, but of designations and directions for
works. And as the intention is different, so accordingly is
the effect; the effect of the one being to overcome an oppo-
nent in argument, of the other to command nature in action.
In accordance with this end is also the nature and order
of the demonstrations. For in the ordinary logic almost all
the work is spent about the syllogism. Of induction the
logicians seem hardly to have taken any serious thought, but
they pass it by with a slight notice, and hasten on to the
formulie of disputation. I on the contrary reject demonstra-
tion by syllogism, as acting too confusedly, and letting nature
slip out of its hands. For although no one can doubt that
things which agree in a middle term agree with one another
(which is a proposition of mathematical certainty), yet it
leaves an opening for deception ; which is this. The syllogism
consists of propositions; propositions of words; and words
are the tokens and .signs of notions. Now if the very notions
of the mind (which are as the soul of words and the basis
of the whole structure) be improperly and over-hastiiy ab-
stracted from facts, vague, not sufficiently definite, faulty
in short in many ways, the whole edifice tumbles, I there-
fore reject the syllogism; and that not only as regards
principles (for to principles the logicians themselves do not
apply it) hut also as regards middle propositions; which,
though obtainable no doubt by the syllogism, are, when so
obtained, barren of works, remote from practice, and alto.
^etbi^ onavailable for the active department of the sciences.
^^^ bow«1s c
TILKSCIS BACON
Ahhoagti fl i cwfo rc I Icarc to tbe syllogism and diese &■
mom and boasted owdcs of doBOnstration their jurisdictioc
orcr fOfnbi arts and sncb as an mauer of opinion (ic
which dqnnatcBi I leare aQ as h is), yet in dealing witb
tht nature of tfainss I aae iwdncti on throtigfaout, and thai
in &e auiior proposidoos as wefl as tiie major. For 1
eoackler indncdon to be Oat fonn of danonstration which
upboMs Ihe atvst, aod closes with aatare. and comes to the
TUy brink of operatkxi, if it does not actaally deal with it
Hence it follows thai the order of demonstration is like-
wise inrerted. For hitherto tbe proceeding has been to fly
at once from tbe sense and particalan up to the moat gen-
eral propositions, as certain fixed poles for tbe argmnent to
turn upon, and from these to derirc the rest hy middle terms :
a short way, no doubt, bat precipiuie ; and one which wilt
never lead to mturc, thot^ h offers an easy and ready
w^ lo dispoUtion. Now my plan is to proceed r^^laily
and gradually from one a»oni to anodicr, so that dtc most
general arc not reached tiD the last: hut then when yoa
do come to them you find them to be not empty notions,
bat well defined, and sncb as nature would really recognise
as her first principles, and sncb as lie at the heart and mar-
row of thii^gs.
Bttt the greatest change I intr odoce is in the form itsdf
of inductioo and the judgment made thereby. For the m-
ductioD of which the logicians speak, which proceeds fajr
simple enumeration, is a paerile thing; coodndes at hazard;
is always liable to be opset by a contradictory instance;'
takes into account only what is known and ordinaiy;
leads to no result
Now what the sciences stand in need of b a form of in-'
dnction which shall analyse experience and take it to piecc%|
and by a due process of exclusion and rejectian lead to an '
eritabic conclusion. And if that ordinary mode of Ji
ment practised by the logicians was so laborions, and fm
exercise for such great wits, how mncfa more laboor most
be prepared to bestow upon this other, which is extracted
merely out of the depths of the mind, bat out of tbe vttj
bowels of nature.
Kor is this aU. For I also sink tb« foundations of A*
INSTAUTIATIO MAGNA
sciences deeper and firmer; and I begin the inquiry nearer
the source than men have done heretofore; submitting to
examination those things which the common logic takes on
trust. For first, the logicians borrow the priuciples of each
science from the science itself; secondly, they hold in rever-
ence the first notions of the mind; and lastly, they receive
as conclusive the immediate informations of the sense, when
well disposed. Now upon the first point, I hold that true logic
ought to enter the several provinces of science armed with a
higher authority than belongs to the principles of those
sciences themselves, and ought to call those putative prin-
ciples to account until they are fully established. Then
with regard to the first notions of the intellect; there is
not one of the impressions taken by the intellect when left
to go its own way, but I hold it for suspected, and no way
established, until it has submitted to a new trial and a fresh
judgment has been thereupon pronounced. And lastly, the
information of the sense itself I sift and examine in many
ways. For certain it is that the senses deceive; but then
at the same time they supply the means of discovering their
own errors ; only the errors are here, the means of discovery
are to seek.
The sense fails in two ways. Sometimes it gives no in-
formation, sometimes it gives false information. For first,
there are very many things which escape the sense, even
when best disposed and no way obstructed; by reason either
of the subtlety of the whole body, or the minuteness of the
parts, or distance of place, or slowness or else swiftness of
motion, or familiarity of the object, or other causes. And
again when the sense does apprehend a thing its appre-
hension is not much to be relied upon. For the testimony
and information of the sense has reference always to man,
not to the universe; and it is a great error to assert that
the sense is the measure of things.
To meet these difficulties, T have sought on all sides dili-
gently and faithfully to provide helps for the sense — substi-
tutes to supply its failures, rectifications to correct its er-
rors; and this I endeavour to accomplish not so much by
instruments as by experiments. For the subtlety of experi-
.auatfi is far greater than that of the sense itself, even when
Bd FRANCIS BACOM
assisted by exquisite instruments ; such experiments, I mean^i
as are skilfully and artificially devised for the express pur-
pose of determining the point in question. To the immediate
and proper perception of the sense therefore I do not give
much weight; but I contrive that the office of the sense
shall be only to judge of the experiment, and that the experi-
ment itself shall judge of the thing. And thus I conceive that
I perform the office of a true priest of the sense (from wbicb
atl knowledge in nature must be sought, unless men mean to
go mad) and a not unskilful interpreter of its oracles;
and that while others only profess to uphold amj cultivate
the sense, I do so in fact. Such then are the provisions I
make for finding the genuine light of nature and kindling
and bringing it to bear. And they would be sufficient of
themselves, if the human intellect were even, and like
a fair sheet of paper with no writing on it. But since the
minds of men are strangely possessed and beset, so that
there is no true and even surface left to reflect the genuine
. Wys of things, it is necessary to seek a remedy for this
[ also.
' Now the idols, or phantoms, by which the mind is oc-
cupied are either adventitious or innate. The adventitious
come into the mind from without; namely, either from the
doctrines and sects of philosophers, or from perverse rules
of demonstration. But the innate are inherent in the very
nature of the intellect, which is far more prone to error
than the sense is. For let men please themselves as th<y
will in admiring and almost adoring the human mind, this
is certain: that as an uneven mirror distorts the rays of
objects according to its own figure and section, so the mind,
when it receives impressions of objects through the sense,
cannot be trusted to report them truly, but in forming its
notions mises up its own nature with the nature of thing."!.
And as the first two kinds of iflols are hard to eradicate,
so idols of this last l(ind cannot be eradicated at all. All that
can be done is to point them out, so that this insidious action
of the mind may be marked and reproved (else as fast as
old errors are destroyed new ones will spring up out of the
ill complexion of the mind itself, and so we shall have but
a change or errors, and not a clearance) ; and to lay it
down once far alt as a fixed and established maxim, that
the intellect is not qualified to judge except by means ol
induction, and induction in its legitimate form. This doc-
Irfne then of the expurgation of the intellect to qualify it
for dealing with truth, is comprised in three refutations :
the refutation of the Philosophies; the refutation of the
D^fnonstrationa ; and the refutation of the Natural Human
Reason. The explanation of which things, and of the trus
r^Qtign between the nature of things and the nature of the
gitpd, is as the strewing and decoration of the bridal chamber
of the Mind and the Universe, the Divine Goodness pst
sisting; out of which marriage let us hope (and be this
the prayer of the bridal song') there may spring helps to
man, and a line and race of inventions that may in &ov(W
degree subdue and overcome the necessities and miseries gf
humanity. This is the second part of the work.
But I design not only to indicate and mark out the ways,
but also to enter them. And therefore the third part of the
work embraces the Phenomena of the Universe; that is to
say, experience of every kind, and such a natural his-
tory as may serve for a foundation to build philosophy
upon. For a good method of demonstration or form of
interpreting nature may keep the mind from going astray
or stumbling, but it is not any excellence of method thai
can supply it witli the material of knowledge. Those how-^
ever who aspire not to guess and divine, but to discover
and know; who propose not to devise mimic and fabulans
worlds of their own. but to examine and dissect the nature
of this very world itself; must go to facts themselves for
everything. Nor can the place of this labour and search
^fld worldwide perambulation bo supplied by any genius
qr meditation or argumentation; no, not if all men's wits
could meet in one. This therefore we must have, or the
business must be for ever abandoned. But up to this day
such has been the condition of men in this matter, that
it is no wonder if nature will not give herself into their
For first, the information of the sense itself, sometimes
failing, sometimes false; observation, careless, irregular, an4
PR&KCIS BAC»H
led by chance; tradition, vain and fed cm rumour; praetiK
slavishly bent upon its work; experiment, blind, stupid,
vague, and prematurely broken off; lastly, natural history,
trivial and poor; — all these have contributed to supply the
understanding with very bad materials for philosophy and
the sciences.
Then an attempt is made to mend the matter by a pre-
posterous subtlety and winnowing of argument. Bat this
comes too late, the case being already past remedy ; and is
far from setting the business right or sifting away the
errors. The only hope therefore of any greater increase or
progress lies in a reconstruction of the sciences.
Of this reconstruction the foundation must be laid it
natural history, and that of a new kind and gathered on a new
principle. For it is in vain that you polish the mirror if
there are no images to be reflected ; and it is as necessary that
the intellect should be supplied with fit matter to work upon,
as with safeguards to guide its working. But my history
differs from that in use (as my logic does) in many things,
in end and office, in mass and composition, in subtlety, in
selection also and setting forth, with a view to the operationi
which are to follow.
For first, the object of a natural history which I propose
is not so much to delight with variety of matter or to help
with present use of experiments, as to give light to the dis-
covery of causes and supply a suckling philosophy with its
first food. For though it he true that I am principally in pur-
suit of works and the active department of the sciences, yet I
wait for harvest-time, and do not attempt to mow tl
or to reap the green corn. For I well know that
once rightly discovered will carry whole troops of works
along with them, and produce them, not here and there one,,
but in clusters. And that unseasonable and puerile hurry
to snatch hy way of earnest at the first works which come
within reach, I utterly condemn and reject, as an Atalanta'*
apple that hinders the race. Such then is tlie office of tbift
natural history of mine.
Next, with regard to the mass and composition of it;
mean it to be a history not only of nature free and at large
(when she is left to her own course and does her work her
own way)-^uch as that of the heavenly bodies, meteors,
urth and sea, minerals, plants, animals, — but much more of
nature under constraint and vexed ; that is to say, whan by
ari and the hand of man she is forced out of her natural
Slate, and squeezed and moulded. Therefore I set down at
'ength all experiments of the mechanical arts, of the oper-
ative part of the liberal arts, of the many crafts which have
''ot yet grown into arts properly so called, so far as I have
''5*1 able to examine them and as they conduce to the end in
"iew. Nay (to say the plain truth) I do in fact (low and
Vulgar as men may think it) count more upon this part both
'Of helps and safeguards than upon the other; seeing that the
'^^ture of things betrays itself more readily under the vexa-
^^na of art than in its natural freedom.
^or do I confine the history to Bodies ; but I have
^ought it my duty besides to make a separate history
^^ such Virtues as may be considered cardinal in nature. I
^«an those original passions or desires of matter which
*^^wstitute the primary elements of nature; such as Dense
***d Rare, Hot and Cold, Solid and Fluid, Heavy and Light,
^*ld several others.
Then again, to speak of subtlety: I seek out and get to-
S^ther a kind of experiments much subtler and simpler than
Pilose which occur accidentally. For I drag into light ma.iy
tilings which no one who was not proceeding by a regular
^nd certain way to the discovery of causes would have
thought of inquiring after; being indeed in themselves of no
Rreat use; which shows that they were not sought for on
their own account; but having just the same relation to
tilings and works which the letters of the alphabet have to
Speech and words— which, though in themselves useless, are
the elements of which all discourse is made up.
Further, in the selection of the relation and experiments
I conceive I have been a more cautious purveyor than those
\fftio have hitherto dealt with natiiral history. For I admit
nothing but on the faith of eyes, or at least of careful and
severe examination; so that nothing is exaggerated for
wonder's sake, but what I state is sound and without mixture
of fables or vanity. All received or current falsehoods also
(which by strange negligence have been allowed for many
I
n a dear account of &t
;n knowing exactly how
i whether there be anj
VRANCIS BAOOlf
tgea to prevail and become established) I proscribe ani
brand by name; that the sciences may be no more troubled
with them. For it has been well observed that the fables
and superstitions and follies which nurses instil into chil-
dren do serious injury to their minds; and the same con-
sideration makes me anxious, having the management ol
the childhood as it were of philosophy in its course of
natural history, not to let it accustom itself in the beginning
to any vanity. Moreover, whenever I come to a new experi-
ment of any subtlety (though it be in my own opinion certain
and approved), I nevertheless subjoi
manner in which I made it; that mi
each point was made out, may set
error connected with it, and raay arouse themselves to devise
proofs more trustworthy and exquisite, if such
found ; snd finally, I interpose everywhere admonitions and
scruples and cautions, with a religious care to eject, repress,
find as it were exorcise every kind of phantasm.
Lastly, knowing how much the si^t of man's mind is dis-
tracted by experience and history, and how hard it is at the
first (especially for minds either tender or preoccupied) to
become familiar with nature, I not un frequently subjoin
observations of my own, being as the first offers, indiiu>
lions, and as it were glances of history towards philosophy;
both by way of an assurance to men that they will be kept
for ever tossing on the waves of experience, and also that
when the time comes for the intellect to begin its work, it
may find everything the more ready. By such a Qaturall
history then as I have described, I conceive that a safe a
convenient approach may be made to nature, and mattef
r supplied of good quality and well prepared for the undo'*
standing to work upoiL
And now that we have surrounded the intellect with faidi->
ful helps and guards, and got together with most carefid'
selection a regular army of divine works, it may seem that
we have no more to do but to proceed to philosophy itself
And yet in a matter so difficult and doubtful ther
some things which it seems necessary to premise, part^
ior convenience of explanation, partly for present use.
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FRANCIS BAOOK
in a certain eaarsc tad mj : acd yet establisbea pforidon-
aJI; ecTtaia Atgnts of aMuraace, for use and relief until
dte BoaA shall arrive at a knowkdse of causes in which it
can rest. For ctcii those schools of philosophy which hdd
the absohite irapossibilitr of knowing anything were not
inferior to those which took apoo them to proDonsce.
But then they did not provide helps for the sense and tmdcf-
standlng, as I have done, bat simply toolc away all tfadr
anthoriij: which is quite a different tfain^— almost the
The sixth part of nqr work (to which tbe rest is sA-
serrient and ministrant) discloses and sets forth that philos-
ophy which by the legilimate, chaste, and severe course of
inquiry which i have explained and provided is at leng^
developed and established. The completion however of diis
last part is a thing both above my strength and beyond my
hopes. I have made a beginning of the work — a beginning,
as I hope, not unimportant: — the fortune of the human nee
will give the issue : — such an issue, it may be, as in the pres-
ent condition of things and men's minds cannot easily be
conceived or imagined. For the matter in hand is no mere
felicity of speculation, but the real business and fortunes of
the human race, and all power of operation. For man is
but the servant and interpreter of nature: what he does
and what he knows is only what he has observed of nature's
order in fact or in thought; beyond this he knows nothing
and can do nothing. For the chain of causes cannot by any
force be loosed or broken, nor can nature be commanded
except by being obeyed. And so those twin objects, human
Knowledge and human Power, do really meet in one; and it
is from ignorance of causes that operation fails.
And all depends on keeping the eye steadily fixed upon the
facts of nature and so receiving their images simply as they
are. For God forbid that we should give out a dream of
our own imagination for a pattern of the world; rather may
he graciously grant to us to write an apocalypse or true
vi'iion of the footsteps of the Creator imprinted on bia
INSTAURATIO MAGNA
I4B
as the Erst fruits of creation, and didst breathe into the face
of man the intellectual light as the crown and consummation
thereof, guard and protect this work, which coming from
thy goodness returneth to thy glory. Thou when thou
tarnedst to look upon the works which thy hands had made,
saweat that all was very good, and didst rest from thy labours.
But man, when he turned to look upon the work which his
hands had made, saw that all was vanity and vexation of
spiti^ and could find no rest therein. Wherefore if we
labour in thy works with the sweat of our brows thou wilt
make us partakers of thy vision and thy sabbath. Humbly
we pray that this mind may be steadfast in us, and that
ttirough these our hands, and the hands of others to whom
thou shalt give the same spirit, thou wilt vouchsafe to endow
_ttK-liutQaii family with new n
PREFACE
TO THE NOVUM ORGANUM
THOSE who have taken upon them to lay down the
]aw of nature as a thing already searched out and
understood, whether they have spoken in simple
surance or professional affectation, have therein done phi-
losophy and the sciences great injury. For as they have
been successful in inducing belief, so they have been effective
in quenching and stopping inquiry; and have done i
harm by spoiling and putting an end to other men's efforts
than good by their own. Those on the other hand who have
taken a contrary course, and asserted that absolutely nothing
can be known, — whether it were from hatred of the ai
sophists, or from uncertainty and fluctuation of mind, oi
from a kind of fulness of learning, that they fell upon tlus
opinion, — have certainly advanced reasons for it that arc not
to be despised; but yet they have neither started from true
principles nor rested in the just conclusion, zeal and affecta-
tion having carried them much too far. The more ancient
of the Greeks (whose writings arc lost) took up with bettet
judgment a position between these two extremes, — betweot
the presumption of pronouncing on everything, and At:
despair of comprehending anythine: and though frequenflr
and bitterly complaining of the difficulty of inquiry and the
obscurity of things, and like impatient horses champing ti
bit, they did not the less follow up their object and enga^.
with Nature; thinking (it seems) that this very question,—
viz. whether or no anything can be kno«Ti. — was to be
settled not by arguing, but by tr>'ing. And yet they too,
trusting entirely to the force of their understanding, applied
no rule, but made everything turn upon hard thinking' a
perpetual working and exercise of the mind.
Now my method, though hard to practise, is easy to e»
I plain; and it is this. I propose to establish progresdn
150
NOVUM ORGANUM
JtagcB of certainty. The evidence of the sense, helped and
guarded by a certahi process of correction, I retain. But
the mental operation which follows the act of sense I for
the most part reject; and instead of it 1 open and lay out a
new and certain path for the mind to proceed in, starting
directly from the simple sensuous perception. The necessity
of this was felt no doubt by those who attributed so much
importance to Logic; showing thereby that they were in
search of helps for the understanding, and had no confidence
in the native and spontaneous process of the mind. But
this remedy comes too late to do any good, when the mind
is already, through the daily intercourse and conversation
of life, occupied with unsound doctrines and beset on all
aides by vain imaginations. And therefore that art of
Logic, coming (as I said) too late to the rescue, and no way
able to set matters right again, has had the effect of fixing
errors rather than disclosing truth. There remains but one
course for the recovery of a sound and healthy condition, —
namely, that the entire work of the understanding be com-
menced afresh, and the mind itself be from the very outset
not left to take its own course, but guided at every step ; and
the business be done as if by machinery, Certainly if in
things mechanical men had set to work with their naked
hands, without help or force of instruments, just as in
things intellectual they have set to work with little else than
the naked forces of the understanding, very small would the
matters have been which, even with their best efforts applied
in conjunction, they could have attempted or accomplished.
Now (to pause while upon this example and look in it as
in a glass) let us suppose that some vast obelisk were (for
the decoration of a triumph or some such magnificence) to
be removed from its place, and that men should set to work
upon it with their naked hands; would not any sober spec-
tator think them mad? And if they should then send for
more people, thinking that in that way they might manage
it, would he not think them all the madder? And if they
then proceeded to make a selection, putting away the weaker
liands, and using only the strong and vigorous, would he not
think them madder than ever? And if lastly, not content
with this, they resolved to call in aid the art of athletics.
m
ind ■
But
FRANCIS BACON
and required all their men to come with hands, arms, sndl
sinews well anointed and medicated according to the rules f
of art, would he not cry out that they were only taking I
pains to show a kind of method and discretion in their mad- f
ness? Yet just so il is that men proceed in matters i
tellectual, — with just the same kind of mad effort and use-
less combination of forces, — when they hope great thing«
either from the number and cooperation or from the ex-
cellency and acuteness of individual wits; yea, and when
they endeavour by Logic (which may be considered as a
kind of athletic art) to strengthen the sinews of the tinder-
standing; and yet with all this study and endeavour it i
apparent to any true judgment that they are but applyin
the naked intellect all the lime; whereas in every great work
to be done by the hand of man it is manifestly impossible,
without instruments or machinery, either for the strength
of each to be exerted or the strength of all to be united.
Upon these premises two things occur to me of which,
that they may not be overlooked, I would have men reminded-
First it falls out fortunately as I think for the allaying of
contradictions and heart-burnings, that the honour and
reverence due to the ancients remains untouched and un-
diminished; while I may carry out my designs and at the
same time reap the fruit of my modesty. For if I should
profess that I. going the same road as the ancients, havl
something better to produce, there must needs have been
some comparison or rivalry between us (not to be avoided
by any art of words) in respect of excellency or ability o
wit; and though in this there would be nothing unlawful or'
new (for if there be anything misapprehended by them, o
falsely laid down, why may not I, using a liberty commoa
to all, take exception to it?) yet the contest, however just'
and allowable, would have been an unequal one perhaps, la
respect of the measure of my own powers. As it is how-
ever, — my object being to open a new way for the under-
standing, a way by them untried and unknown, — the ca
altered; party zeal and emulation are at an end; and I ap-
pear merely as a guide to point out the road; an office of
small authority, and depending more upon a kind of luck
than upon any ability or excellency. And thus much relates
NOVUM ORGANtJM 153
to the persons only. The other point of which I would have
men reminded relates to the matter itself.
Be it remembered then that I am far from wishing to
interfere with the philosophy which now flourishes, or with
any other philosophy more correct and complete than this
which has been or may hereafter be propounded. For I
do not object to the use of this received philosophy, or others
like it, for supplying matter for disputations or omamenta
for discourse, — for the professor's lecture and for the busi-
ness of Hfe. Nay more, I declare openly that for these
uses the philosophy which I bring forward will not be much
available. It does not lie in the way. It cannot be caught
tip in passage. It does not flatter the understanding by con-
formity with preconceived notions. Nor will it come down
to the apprehension of the vulgar except by its utility and
effects.
I-et there be therefore (and may it be for the benefit of
both) two streams and two dispensations of knowledge; and
in like manner two tribes or kindreds of students in philoso-
phy — tribes not hostile or alien to each other, but bound
together by mutual services; — let there in short be one
niethod for the cultivation, another for the invention, of
knowledge.
And for those who prefer the former, either from hurry
or from considerations of business or for want of mental
power to take in and embrace the other (which must needs
l>e most men's case), I wish that they may succeed to their
desire in what they are about, and obtain what they are
pursuing. But if any man there be who. not content to rest
in and use the knowledge which has already been discovered,
^spires to penetrate further; to overcome, not an adversary
•n argument, but nature in action; to seek, not pretty and
probable conjectures, but certain and demonstrable knowl-
'^S^; — I invite all such to join themselves, as true sons of
""owledge, with me, that passing by the outer courts of
"ature^ which numbers have trodden, we may find a way
^' length into her inner chambers. And to make my meaning
f'^arer and to familiarise the thing by giving it a name, I
•■^^e chosen to call one of these methods or ways Anticipation
"' the Mind, the other Interpretation of Nature,
rRANCTS BAOON
Moreover I have one request to make. I have on nvs
own part made it my care and study that the things wliicH 1
sbalE propound should not only be true, but should slso t>e
presented to men's minds, how strangely soever preoccupied
and obstructed, in a manner not harsh or unpleasant. It i>
but reasonable however (especially in so great a restoratio* I
of learning and knowledge) that I should claim of men <z>0* I
favour in return; which is this; If any one would form ** I
Opinion or judgment either out of his own observation, oSi
out of the crowd of authorities, or out of the forms of de^i^jj
onstration (which have now acquired a sanction like that *»J
judicial laws), concerning these speculations of mine, »"
him not hope that he can do it in passage or by the by ; "M^^'
let him examine the thing thoroughly; let him make s» :*nt
little trial for himself of the way which I describe and ^ay
out; let him familiarise his thoughts with that subtlety *^'
nature to which experience bears witness ; let him correct "J
seasonable patience and due delay the depraved and de ^ r=~ t''
rooted habits of his mind ; and wiien all this is done and ***
bas begun to be his own master, let him (if he will) M-i^i-Sfl
his own judgment.
PREFACE TO THE
FIRST FOLIO EDITION
OF SHAKESPEARE'S PLAYS
H (16^3)
^^H To THE Great Variety of Readers
y "^ROM the most able, to him that can but spell: There
■^ you are miniber'd. We had rather you were weighd.
'•^~ Especially, when the fate of all Boofces depends vpon
Tout capacities : and not of your heads alone, but of your
MiTses, Well ! it is now publiqiie, & you wil stand for your
►riuiledges wee know : to read, and censure. Do so, but buy
* first. That doth best commend a Booke, the Stationer
sies. Then, how odde soeuer your braines be, or your wise-
lomes, make your licence the same, and spare not. ludge
'our sixe-pen'orth, your shillings worth, your fiue shillings
^OTth at a time, or higher, so you rise to the iust rates, and
'elcome. But, what euer you do, Buy. Censure will not
■fine a Trade, or make the lacke go. And though you be a
fta-gistrate of wit, and sit on the Stage at Black-Friers, or
f»^ Cock-pit, to arraigne Playes dailie, know, these Playes
laue had their triall alreadie, and stood out al! Appeals; and
c> now come forth quitted rather by a Decree of Court, then
•*»y purchas'd Letters of commendation.
Xt had bene a thing, we confesse, worthie to haue bene
„,XJttIe more than halt of Shakespearp's playa were published during hii
l*»e«lMi and in the puhlicalion ot these there is no evidence that the
t"«lH)r had any hand. S-ven years after iiis -li-'th. Inhn H™inte and
HerWT Cnndell, two ot his fellow-aclorB, cllec
Bnd. m iSj3, isjued them along with the otb-rs
kni>»B OB the Ffr^l FalJo. Whrn one conaidi
«a«t had it not been for [Be enterprise of these
■d the unpublished plays,
n a single volume, usually
s what would have been
ISB HEBfTNO&CONBELL
wished, that the Author hinisclfc had liu'd to haue set fort**,
and ouerseen his owre writings; But since it hath bLn
ordain'd otherwise, and he by death departed from (bsk.i
right, we pray you do not envie his Friends, the office of thei*
care, and paine, to haue collecled & publish'd them ; and so
to haue publish'd them, as where (before) you were abus'd
with diuerse stolne. and surreptitious copies, maimed, and
deformed by the frauds and steahhes of iniurious imposters,
that expos'd them : euen those, are now offer'd to your vie'^w
rur'd, and perfect of their limbes; and all the rest, absolut:*
in their numbers, as he conceiued them. Who. as he wa"'
a happie imitator of Nature, was a most gentle expresser ^
it. His mind and hand went together: And what he thougl*
he vttered with that eastnesse. that wee haue scarse recei»<^
from him a blot in his papers. But it is not our prouino
who onely gather his works, and giue them you, to prai*
him. It is yours that reade him. And there we hope, '
your diuers capacities, you will finde enough, both to dra^
and hold you: for his wit can no more lie hid. then it col—
he lost, Reade him, therefore; and againe, and againe: >"
if then you doe not tike him, surely you are in some mani f *
danger, not to vnderstand him. And so we leaue yot>
other of his Friends, whom if you need, can bee your guici*
if you neede them not, you can leade your selues, and oth<
And such Readers wc wish him.
loHN Heminge.
HSNUG COKDEtX.
» 10
1
PREFACE TO THE
PHILOSOPHIAE NATURALIS
PRINCIPIA MATHEMATICA
BY SIR ISAAC NEWTON. (1686)
SINCE the ancients (as we are told by Pappus) made
great account of the science of mechanics in the in-
vestigation of natural things ; and the moderns, laying
aside substantial forms and occult qualities, have en-
deavored to subject the phenomena of nature to the laws of
mathematics, I have in this treatise cultivated mathematics
so far as it regards philosophy. The ancients considered
mechanics in a twofold respect; as rational, which proceeds
accurately by demonstration, and practical. To practical
mechanics all the manual arts belong, from which mechanics
took its name. But as artificers do not work with perfect
ac€:uracy, it comes to pass that mechanics is so distinguished
from geometry, that what is perfectly accurate is called
geometrical; what is less so is called mechanical. But the
errors are not in the art, but in the artificers. He that works
With less accuracy is an imperfect mechanic; and if any
could work with perfect accuracy, he would be the most per-
^ct mechanic of all; for the description of right lines and
circles, upon which geometry is founded, belongs to me-
chanics. Geometry does not teach us to draw these lines, but
'"Squires them to be drawn; for it requires that the learner
*"Outd first be taught to describe these accurately, before he
tu^ir luac Newton, the giat English mathcmBtidin sod ebystciEt. mi
S?'? at Wfwlslhorpe in i64J. and d«d St K=n8inr~ '" — "" '-'■' '
Prof ...-^ a, f^^Y^,,^. ._j ..._ „_.._
"of-ajomhip
?»«BT of tie
?^ J»r«ident
„. - „.B UniTenity in PaMiami
mini icfonnffd Ihe English eoinage, and for twenty-fivr
of the Rdyal Society. H;i ihecry of ihe law of ut
e most important of hiq mat\y discoveries, is e:iipoun
'J' PbiloBophiae Naturairrpriodpia' Math";
FllaafU," from which this Preface is uiiislated.
U2
SIR ISAAC NEWTOW
enters upon geometry; then it shows how by these operations
problema may be solved. To describe right lines and circles
are problems, but not geometrical problems. The solution
of these problems is required from mechanics; and by ge-
ometry the use of them, when so solved, is shown ; and it is
the glory of geometry that from those few principles,
fetched from without, it is able to produce so many things
Therefore geometry is founded in mechanical practice, b
is nothing but that part of universal mechanics which ac<
curalely proposes and demonstrates the art o£ measuring.
But since the manual arts are chiefly conversant in the mov-
ing of bodies, it comes tO pass that geometry is commonly re-
ferred to their magnitudes, and mechanics to their ntotion.
In this sense rational mechanics wiil be the science of e
tions resulting from any forces whatsoever, and of the forces
required to produce any motions, accurately proposed and'
demonstrated. This part of mechanics was cultivated by the
ancients in the five powers which relate to manual arts, who
considered gravity (it not being a manual power) no othei^
wise than as it moved weights by those powers. Our desigr^
not respecting arts, but philosophy, and oar subject, not man-
ual, but natural powers, we consider chiefly those things
which relate to gravity, levity, elastic force, the resistance
of fluids, and the like forces, whether attractive or impulsivej
and therefore we offer this work as mathematical prindplcf
of philosophy; for ail the difficulty of philosophy seems t
consist in this — from the phenomena of motions to investi-
gate the forces of nature, and then from these forces to de»
monstrate the other phenomena ; and to this end the general
propositions in the first and second book are directed. In
the third book we give an example of this in the explicatioi^
of the system of the World; for by the propositions n)&th»-
matically demonstrated in the first book, we there derive
from the celestial phenomena the forces of gravity with]
which bodies tend to the sun and the several planets. Thei^
from these forces, by other propositions which are also ma "
ematical, we deduce the motions of the planets, the com<._,
the moon, and the sea, I wish we could derive the rest of the
phenomena o£ nature by the same kind of reasoning from
mechanical principles; for I am induced by many reasons
TO THE PRINCIPIA ISg
suspect that they may all depend upon certain forces by
jwhich the particles of bodies, by some causes hitherto un-
known, are either mutually impelled towards each other,
:and cohere in regular figures, or are repelled and recede
from each other; which forces being unknown, philosophers
have hitherto attempted the search of nature in vain; hut I
'hope the principles here laid down will afford some light
^either to that or some truer method of philosophy.
In the publication of this work, the most acute and uni-
Tcrsally learned Mr. Edmund Halley not only assisted me
jwith his pains in correcting the press and taking care of the
ischemes, but it was to his solicitations that its becotbing
I public is owing; for when he had obtained of me my demon-
!] atrations of the figure of the celestial orbils, he continually
j pressed me to communicate the same to the Royal Society,
\ wrho afterwards, by their kind encouragement and entreaties,
j ei^aged me to think of publishing them. But after I had bfl-
ijpin to consider the inequalities of the Kmar motions, and
I had entered upon some other things relating to the laws and
1 measures of gravity, and other forces ; and the figures that
I wBuId be described by bodies attracted according to given
laws; and the motion of several bodies moving among thera-
I selves; the motion of bodies in resisting mediums; the forces,
J densities, and motions of mediums; the orbits of the comets,
I and such like ; I put off that publication till I had made a
:, Eearch into those matters, and could put out the whole to-
I gether. What relates to the lunar motions (being imperfect)
I have put all together in the corollaries of proposition 66,
to avoid being obliged to propose and distinctly demonstrate
, the several tilings there contained in a method more prolix
than the subject deserved, and interrupt the series of the
several propositions. Some things, found out after the rest,
I chose to insert in places less suitable, rather than change
the number of the propositions and the citations. I heartily
beg that what I have here done may be read with candor;
and thai the defects I have been guilty of upon this difficult
subject may be not so much reprehended as kindly supplied,
and Investigated by new endeavors of my readers.
Cambridge, Triniiy College, IsAAC NeWTON.
May 8, i6S6.
PREFACE TO FABLES,
ANCIENT AND MODERN
BY JOHN DRYDEN. (i7«>)
*n^IS with a poet, as wilii a man who designs to IN
I and is rery exact, as he supposes, in casting u^
-L cost beforehand; but, generally qieaking, be tsj
taken in his account, and reckoos short of the expend
fint intended. He alters his mind as the work prod
um) wfl] have tliis or that conrenieocc roore, of whicl
bad not thongfat when be began. So has it happeo'd to'
I btve built a bouse, wbere I intended bat a lodge; yet j
better success than a certain oobleman,* who, beginniagj
k dog kennel, never liVd to finish the palace be had conn
From translating die first of Homer's Iliads (wbl
intended as an essay to the whole work) I proceeded m
translatioii of the nrtlfth book of Ortd's MrtamorpH
because it contains, among other things, the canscsj
b^inning, and ending, of the Trojan war. Here I oci{j
reason to have stopp'd; hot the speeches of Ajax and uS
ViDg next in mj way. I cooM not baSc 'em. When I
contpass'd them, I was so taken with the former pari ol
fifteenth book, (which is the masterpiece of the «
Urtamorpkosrs.) that I enjoin'd myself the pleasing tal
rend'ring it into English. And now I fooiKi, by the j
ber of my verges, that they began to sweD into a i
volame ; which gave mc an occasion of looking backwtril
■ome beauties of my atttbor, in his former books.
Jate Drfim (i<]i-tf««t. (W trot ^natfic aad laliried BMej
Mw t ymwh ««ai7. *h«r UmiIWIm oI Vinira - JBaeSa * |
hi nt A tt v^OM •« *> a«rw4aS5Sr*Li .u ^r«*^b«^«a|
3 ■MWttw.foM..^ Srt»C^iiwiy'irtSi! C
TO FABLES
161
occurr'd to me the Hunting of the Boar, Cinyras and Myr-
fha, the good-natur'd story of Baucis and Philemon, with
'lie rest, which I hope I have translated closely enough, and
given them the same turn of verse which they had in the
original ; and this, I may say without vanity, is not the talent
of every poet He who has arriv'd the nearest to it, is the
ingenious and learned Sandys, the best versifier of the for-
tter age; if I may properly call it by that name, which was
fie former part of this concluding century. For Spenser
and Fairfax both flourish 'd in the reign of Queen EHzabeth;
great masters in our language, and who saw much farOier
ittto the beauties of our numbers than those who immediate-
ly foUow'd them, Milton was the poetical son of Spenser,
*od Mr, Waller of Fairfax, for we have our lineal de-
scents and clans as well as other families, Spenser more
than once insinuates that the soul of Chaucer was trans-
(ua'd into his body, and that he was begotten by him two
Imndred years after his decease. Milton has acknowledg'd
Id tat that Spenser was his original, and many besides my-
self have heard our famous Waller own that he deriv'd the
harmony of his numbers from the Godfrey of BuUoign,
which was tum'd into English by Mr, Fairfax. Bvt to re-
turn. Having done with Ovid for this time, it came into
my mind that our old English poet, Chaucer, in many things
resembled him, and that with no disadvantage on the side
of the modern author, as I shall endeavor to prove when I
corapare them ; and as I am, and always have been, studious
to promote the honor of my native country, so I soon re-
solv'd to put their merits to the trial, by turning some of the
(Canterbury Tales into our language, as it is now refin'd;
fox by this means, both the poets being set in the same light,
and dress'd in the same English habit, story to be compar'd
^'•tii story, a certain judgment may be made betwixt them
py the reader, without obtruding my opinion on him. Or,
ff I seem partial to my countryman and predecessor in the
^lirel, the friends of antiquity are not few; and besides
"^aoy of the leam'd, Ovid has almost all the beaux, and the
"hole fair sex, his declar'd patrons. Perhaps I have as-
stuii'd somewhat more to myself than they allow me, because
I have advcntur'd to sum up the evidence; but the readers
(s) Hc— vdi. ae
«K tt« j«T. aal Acir p ^ ti egt n^^tas entire, to d«eM
aOBDiAiC ** 1^ sm!s «f *c cnne, or if tbey please,
hamt it ao aBadho- fciiiim teiuR aome otber cotul
w Mm Arid af 07 discoarse, (.
Hz. llBJirt. tan alwxys son
) m tiva Qmaaa I was M to Oiak on Boccac
«ka «•> aot ^rif lii coMBHpMaiy, kot also parsaed (
K«ei^«(l
: fetf witfa diis differcM
lor ba^amgK, at bast
Bdt hOf ««■ iB I I I KtrndL Bitf fiie refon
•I Atir |««K «as wtaOf vriBK •■ Baoan Umsclf. 1
•t Ifa f i wM ■» fci mt afcawh^ i ia frocess of ti
■■M wcAt taffo. ^^iMBar (as jti^ tare bMUul^ bi
I tani^. tal 4E<ir'« •( the I
^ TO FABLES I8J
■ tber would count fourscore and eight before they judg"*!
W him. By the mercy of God, I am already come within
I twenty years of his number, a cripple in my lirabs; but what
I decays are in my mind, the reader must determine. 1 think
toyielf as vigorous as ever in the faculties of my soul, ex-
cepting only my memory, which is not impair'd to any great
I ''tgree; and if I lose not more of it, I have no great reason
to complain. What judgment I had, increases rather than
'finiinishes : and thoughts, such as they are, come crowd-
'"g in so fast upon me, that my only difficulty is to choose
°f to reject; to run them into verse, or to give them the
°tfcer harmony of prose. I have so long studied and practic'd
Poih, that they are grown into a habit, and become famil-
*^i to me. In short, tho' I may lawfully plead some part
•^^ the old gentleman's excuse, yet I will reserve it tilt I
*t»ink I have greater need, and ask no grains of allowance
*^ar the faults of this my present work, but those which are
^tiyen of course to human fraihy. I will not trouble my
*~^aader with the shortness of time in which I writ it, or the
^ ^veral intervals of sickness. They who think too well of
^-^cir own performances are apt to boast in their prefacca
^*.ow little time their works have cost them, and what other
^^usiness of more importance interf er'd ; but the reader will
^^e as apt to ask the question, why they allow'd not a longer
'^;ime to make their works more perfect, and why they bad
^^o despicable an opinion of their judges as to thrust theif
^.ndigested stuff upon them, as if they deserv'd no better.
With this account of my present undertaking, I conclude
'Vhe first part of this discourse; in the second part, as at a
^Kcond sitting, tho' I alter not the draught. I must touch
"Vbe Game features over again, and change the dead color-
Sng* of the whole. In general, I will only say that I have
"written nothing which savors of immorality or profaneness;
at least, I am not conscious to myself of any such inten-
tion. If there happen to be found an irreverent expression,
or a thought too wanton, they are crept into my verses thro*
my inadvertency; if the searchers find any in the cargo, lot
them be stav'd or forfeited, like counterbanded goods; at
least, let their authors be answerable for them, as lieing
■ The foondatioii layer of coloi in ■ painlini^
JOHN DRYDEK
but imported merchandise, and not o( my own manufacture;
On the other side, I have endeavor'd to choose such fables,,
both ancient and modem, as contain in each of them s
instructive moral ; which I could prove by induction, but the
way is tedious, and they leap foremost into sight, without
the reader's trouble of looking after them. I wish I conltt
aSirm, with a safe conscience, that I had taken the same care
in all my former writings ; for it must be own'd, that
supposing verses are never so beautiful or pleasing, yet
if they contain anything which shocks religion, or good '
manners, they are at best what Horace says of good i
bers without good sense. Versus inopes rerum, nugaque
canorts* Thus far, I hope, I ara right in court, withoutj
renouncing to my other right of self-defense, where I havQ
been wrongfully accus'd, and my sense wiredrawn into
blasphemy or bawdry, as it has often heen by a religioui
lawyer," in a late pleading against the stage; in whicfi
he mixes truth with falsehood, and has not forgotti
the old rule of calumniating strongly, that something raxf
remain.
I resume the thrid of my discourse with the first of tiiy
translations, which was the First Iliad of Homer. If it shall
please God to give me longer life, and moderate health, my^
intentions are to translate the whole Hias; provided still
that I meet with those encouragements from the public
which may enable me to proceed in my undertaking i
some cheerfulness. And this I dare assure the world
beforehand, that I have found by trial Homer a mon
pleasing task than Virgil, (tho' I say not the translation
will be less laborious). For the Grecian is more accord*
ing to my genius than the Latin poet. In the works of the
two authors we may read their manners and natural inclina-
tions, which are wholly different. Virgil was of a quie^
sedate temper; Homer was violent, impetuous, and full of
fire. The chief talent of Virgil was propriety of thoughtSi
and ornament of words; Homer was rapid in his thought^
and took all the liberties, both of numbers and of expre
sions, which his language, and the age in which he Iiv'(I|
■jEremy Collier, in bis Shorl Viita ol tht Intmorlalily' and' Prof m
of A> State. 169S.
TO PABLES 165
_ W'd him. Homer's invention was more copious, Vir-
pa more confin'di so that if Homer had not led the way,
*' ^as not in Virgil to have begun heroic poetry ; for nothing
^"^ be more evi<]ent than that the Roman poem is but the
^^Cond part of the lUas; a continuation of the same story,
*c»J the persons already form'd; the manners of ^Eneas
^■"e those of Hector superadded to those which Homer gave
Aim. The adventures of Ulysses in the Odysieis are
imitated in the first six books of Virgil's Mneis; and
tho' the accidents are not the same, (which would have ■
argued him of a servile, copying, and total barrenness of
invention.) yet the seas were the same, in which both the
heroes wander'd; and Dido cannot be denied to he the
poetical daughter of Calypso. The six latter books of Vir-
gil's poem are the four and twenty Iliads contracted: a
quarrel occasion'd by a lady, a single combat, battles fought,
and a town besieg'd. I say not this in derogation to Vir-
gil, neither do I conttadict anything which I have formerly
said in his just praise: for his episodes are almost wholly
of his own invention ; and the form which he has given to
the telling makes the tale his own, even tho' the original
story had been the same. But this proves, however, that
Homer taught Virgil to design; and if invention be the first
virtue of an epic poet, then the Latin poem can only be
allow'd the second place. Mr. Hohbes, in the preface to
his own bald translation of the Ilias (studying poetry as
he did mathematics, when it was too late) — Mr. Hobbes,
I say, begins the praise of Homer where he should have
ended it. He tells us that the first beauty of an epic poem
consists in diction, that is, in the choice of word^ and
harmony of numbers: now the words are the coloring of
the work, which in the order of nature is last to be con-
sider'd. The design, the disposition, the manners, and the
thoughts, are all before it; where any of those are wanting
or imperfect, so much wants or is imperfect in the imitation
of human life; which is in the very definition of a poem.
Words, indeed, like glaring colors, are the first beauties
that arise and strike the sight: but if the draught be false
or lame, the figures ill dispos'd, the manners obscure or
inconsistent, or the thoughts unnatural, then the finest colors
US JOHN DRTDBN
arc but daubing, and tte piece is a beautiful monster at tbi
best Neither Virgil nor Homer were deficient in any of the
former beauties; but in this last, which is expression, lh(
Roman poet is at least equal to the Grecian, as I have ssid
elsewhere; supplying the poverty of his language by lui
musical ear, and by his diligence. But to return; oui
great poets, being so different in their tempers, one cholerit
and sanguine, the other phlegmatic and melancholic;
which makes them them excel in their several ways is that
each of them has follow'd his own natural inclination, u
well in forming the design as in the execution of it. The
very heroes shew their authors: Achilles is hot, impatieol,
revengeful, Impiger, iracundus, inexorabilis, acer'
jEneas patient, considerate, careful of his people, and n
ful to his enemies; ever submissive to the will of Heavea
~~Quo fata IrahtiM retrakuntque sfquamvr.' I could pleass
myself with enlarging on this subject, but am forc'd to
defer it to a fitter time. From all I have said 1 will only
draw this inference, that the action of Homer being
full of vigor than that of Virgil, according to the temper of
the writer, is of consequence more pleasing to the reader.
One warms you by degrees: the other sets you on fire all at
once, and never intermits his heat. 'Tis the same differenct
which Longinus makes betwixt the effects of eloquence in
Demosthenes and Tully. One persuade* j-fHe other com-
mands. You never cool while you read Homer, even not in
the second book (a graceful flattery to his countrymen)!
but he hastens from the ships, and concludes not that book
till he has made you an amends by the violent playing of 1.
new machine. From thence he hurries on his action with
variety of events, and ends it in less compass than
months. This vehemence of his, I confess, is more suitable
to my temper; and therefore I have translated his first book
with greater pleasure than any part of Virgil ; but it was not
a pleasure without pains. The continual agitations of tl»
spirits must needs be a weak'ning of any constitution, eape*
cially in age ; and many pauses are requir'd for refreshment
the 'f»ttB
w'ioUoK
IS.?=W^
TO FABLBS
fetwixt the heats; the Iliad of itself being a third part
longer than all Virgil's works together.
This is what I thought needful in this place to say of
Homer. I proceed to Ovid and Chaucer, considering the
former only in relation to the latter. With Ovid ended
the golden age of the Roman tongue; from Chaucer the
purity of the English tongiie began. The manners of the
poets were not unlike: both of them were well bred,
well natur'd, amorous, and libertine, at least in their writ-
ings, il may be also in their lives. Their studies were the
same, philosophy and philology. Both of them were know-
ing in astronomy, of which Ovid's books of the Roman
feasts, and Chaucer's treatise of the Astrolabe, are sufficient
witnesses. But Chaucer was likewise an astrologer, as were
Virgil, Horace, Persius, and ManiUus, Both writ with won-
derful facility and clearness: neither were great inventors;
for Ovid only copied the Grecian fables; and moat of
Chaucer's stories were taken from his Italian contempo-
ra.ries, or their predecessors.' Boccace his Decameron was
first pubJish'd; and from thence our Englishman has bor-
row'd many of his Canterhury Tales; yet that of Palamon
and Arcite was written in all probability by some Italian wit
in a former age, as I shall prove hereafter. The tale of
GrUild was the invention of Petrarch; by him sent to Boc-
ca^ce ; from whom it came to Chaucer. Troiltis and Cressida
jTfas also written hy a Lombard author; but much amplified
our English translator, as well as beautified; the genius
countrymen, in general, being rather to improve an
'ention, than to invent themselves; as is evident not
Ohly in our poetry, but in many of our manufactures. I find
I have anticipated already, and taken up from Boccace be-
fore I come to him; but there is so much less behind; and I
am of the temper of most kings, ivho love to be in debt,
are all for present money, no matter how they pay it after-
wards; besides, the nature of a preface is rambling; never
wholly out of the way, nor in it. This I have leam'd from
the practice of honest Montaigne, and return at my pleasure
to Ovid and Chaucer, of whom I have little more to say.
'Tke jtatenwnts ihai follnw as lo Chaiietr'a sources are moBllj not In
KSatd wilb tba nsulu ef modern schalarship.
Both of fhem built on tlie inventions of other men; yet
since Chaucer liad something of his own, as The Wife of
Bath's Tale. The Cock and the Fox," which I have trans-
lated, and some others, I may justly give our countryman
the precedence in that part ; since I can remember nothing
of Ovid which was wholly his. Both of them understood
the manners, under which name I comprehend ihe passions.
and, in a larger sense, the descriptions of persons, and their
very habits ; for an example, I see Baucis and Philemon as
perfectly before me, as if some ancient painter had drawn
them; and all the pilgrims in the Canterbury Tales, their
faimiars, their features, and the very dress, as distinctly i
1 had supp'd with them at the Tabard in Southwark ; yet
even there too the figures of Chaucer are much more lively,
and set in a better light: which iho' I have not time to prove,
yet I appeal to the reader, and am sure he will clear me
from partiality. The thoughts and words remain to be
consider'd in the comparison of the two poets; and I have
sav'd myself one half of that labor, by owning that Ovid
liv'd when the Roman tongue was in its meridian, Chaucer
in the dawning of our language; therefore that part of the
comparison stands not on an equal foot, any more than the
diction of Ennius and Ovid, or of Chaucer and our present
English. The words are given up as a post not to be de-
fended in our poet, because he wanted the modem art of
fortifying. The thoughts remain to be consider'd, and they
are to be measur'd only by their propriety; that is, as th^
flow more or less naturally from the persons describ'd,
such and such occasions. The vulgar judges, which are
nine parts in ten of ail nations, who call conceits and jingles
wit, who see Ovid full of them, and Qiaucer altogether with-
out them, will think me little less than mad, for preferring
the Englishman to the Roman : yet, with their leave, 1 must
presume to say that the things they admire are only glitter-
ing trifles, and so far from being witty, that in a set"
poem they are nauseous, because they are unnatural. Would
any man who is ready to die for love describe his passion
like Narcissus? Would he think of inopem me eofila
fecit" and a dozen more of such expressions, pour'd oa
VTbc (lat of neiihci of theic foaat wu ongiiul with CtauBM
TO FABLES
Hie neck of one another, and signifying all the same thing?
If this were wit, was this a time to be witty, when the poor
wretch was in the agony of death ? This is just John Little-
wit in Bartholomew Fair," who had a conceit (as he tells
you) left him in his misery: a miserable conceit. On these
occasions the poet shouid endeavor to raise pity; but instead
of this, Ovid is tickling you to laugh. Virgil never made use
of such machines, when he was moving you to commiser-
ate the death of Dido: he would not destroy what he was
building. Chaucer makes Arcite violent in his love, and un-
just in the pursuit of it; yet when he came to die, he made
him think more reasonably: he repents not of his love, for
that had alter'd his character; but acknowledges the in-
justice of his proceedings, and resigns Emilia to Palamon.
What would Ovid have done on this occasion? He would
certainly have made Arcite witty on his deathbed. He had
complain'd he was farther off from possession by being so
near, and a thousand such boyisms, which Chaucer rejected
as below the dignity of the subject. They who think other-
wsc would by the same reason prefer Lucan and Ovid to
Homer and Virgil, and Martial to all four of them. As for
the turn of words, in which Ovid particularly excels all
poets, they are sometimes a fault, and sometimes a beauty,
as they are us'd properly or improperly ; but in strong pas-
sions always to be shunn'd, because passions are serious, and
vrHl admit no playing. The French have a high value for
them; and I confess, they are often what they call delicate,
when they are introdue'd with judgment; but Chaucer writ
with more simplicity, and follow'd nature more closely, than
to use them. I have thus far, to the best of my knowledge,
been an upright judge betwixt the parties in competition,
not meddling with the design nor the disposition of it;
because the design was not their own, and in the disposing
of it they were equal. It remains that I say somewhat of
Chaucer in particular.
In the first place, as he is the father of English poetry, so
I hold him in the same degree of veneration as the Grecians
held Homer or the Romans Virgil. He is a perpetual foun-
taih of good sense, leam'd in all sciences, and therefortf
■■ " Plentr bai madE me poor." — Mela, iii, 466, " B7 Ben Jmuoh*
JOHN DKTDSN
•peaks properly en zll nrbjects: as be Iraev wtitt H s^
to he knows also whea to leave off, a eontineoce wliidi W
practk'd by few writers, and Kairel)' by any of Ifae ancieDli,
excepting Virgil and Horace. One of our late great poett*
IS nmk in bis reputation, because he could never foi^ve aaj
conceit which came in his way, bat swept like a drag-
net, great and small. There was pleitty enough, but the
dishes were ill sorted; whole pyramids of sweetmeats foe
boys and women, but little of solid meat for men. AH
this proceeded not from any want of knowledge, but ol
judgment; neither did he want that in discerning the beautid
and faults of other poets; but only indulg'd himself is th«
luxury of writing; and perhaps knew it was a fault, bat
hop'd the reader would not find it. For this reasouj
tho' he must always be thought a great poet, he is o»
longer esteem'd a good writer; and for ten impression^
which his works have had in so many successive yearS)
yet at present a hundred books are S4:arcety purchaa'd
a twelvemonth: for, as my last Lord Rochester sai^
tho' somewhat profanely, "Not being of God, he could'
not stand."
Chaucer follow'd Nature everywhere, but was never ta
bold to go beyond her; and there ts a great difference ol
being poeta and nimis poeta," if we may believe Catullus,
much as betwixt a modest behavior and afFectatiom. The
verse of Chaucer, I confess, is not harmonious to us; but
'tis like the eloquence of one whom Tacitus commends, it
was auribus islius Icmporis accommodala:" they who Uv'd
with him, and some time after him, thought it musical; and
it continued so even in our judgment, if compar'd with tha
numbers of Lydgate and Gower, his contemporaries: ther*
is the rude sweetness of a Scotch tune in it, which is
natural and pleasing, tho' not perfect. T is true, I cannot go
to far as he who publish'd the last edition of him ;" for he
would make us believe the fault is in our ears, and that there
were really ten syllables in a verse where we find but nine:
but this opinion is not worth confuting; 'tis so gross and
obvious an error, that common sense (which is a rule in
"CowlfT' ""Too imich ■ piwt"— Martial iil. 44 (not CatoUtu).
** Sp^bb whwB mtiduD •cSolutbip hu tiuma to be right in tbia nMm
TO FABLES
171
?
eveiydliflg but matters of faith and revelation) must con-
vincc the reader that equality of numbers in every verse
which we call heroic was either not known, or not always
practic'd. in Chaucer's age. It were an easy matter to pro-
duce some thousands of his verses, which are lame for want
of half a foot, and sometimes a whole one, and which no
pronunciation can make otherwise. We can only say, that
fee liv'd in the infancy of our poetry, and that nothing is
bfcaught to perfection at the first. We must be children be-
fot-e we grow men. There was an Ennius, and in process of
'imt a Lucilius and a Lucretius, before Virgil and Horace;
e^r«n after Chaucer there was a Spenser, a Harrington, a
F^^irfax, before Waller and Denhara were in being: and
^■■j.T numbers were in their nonage till these last appear'd.
I need say little of his parentage, life, and fortunes;" they
a.K-« to be found at large in all the editions of his works. He
^»^^M employ'd abroad and favor'd by Edward the Third,
^*-»chard the Second, and Henry the Fourth, and was poet,
*-^ I suppose, to all three of them. In Richard's time, I
<^«:3ubt, he was a little dipp'd in the rebellion of the com-
^^^"Kns, and being brother-in-law to John of Ghant, it was no
*^^'^^"<inder if he follow'd the fortunes of that family, and was
'^^'"■^ll with Henry the Fourth when he had depos'd his pred-
^ ^Seasor. Neither is it to be admir'd," that Henry, who was
^^- wise as well as a valiant prince, who claim'd by succession,
^^-"5id was sensible that his title was not sound, but was
*^-ightfully in Mortimer, who had married the heir of York;
^^"^ was not to be adrair'd, I say, if that great politician should
^»e pleas'd to have the greatest wit of those times in his
^TiterestE, and to be the trumpet of his praises. Augustus
^nad given him the example, by the advice of Mascenas, who
^^commended Virgil and Horace to him ; whose praises
^dp'd to make him popular while he was alive, and after his
^eath have made him precious to posterity. As for the re-
^gioD of our poet, he seems to have some little bias towards
the opinions of Wyciiffe, after John of Ghant his patron;
somewhat of which appears in the tale of Piers Plowman."
Yet I cannot blame him for inveighing so sharply against the
"What follows on Chaucer's life is fall of errors. "Wondered aL
>A iptiriaui " Ptawmu's Ttle" wu included Id the older editions of
JOHN DRYDEN
in his age; their pride, their ambttiaq
their pomp, their avarice, their worldly interest, dcseiVd
the lashes which he gave them, both in that and in most ol
his Cail^^bury Tales: neither has his contemporaiy Boccacc
spar'd them. Yet both those poets liv'd in much esteem wiA
good and holy men in orders; for the scandal which is giveq
by particular priests reflects not on the sacred functtoa
Chaucer's Monk, his Canon, and his Friar, took not from
the character of his Good Parson. A satirical poet is the
check of the laymen on bad priests. We are only to talca
care that we involve not the innocent with the guilty in the
same condemnation. The good cannot be too much honor'^
nor the bad too coarsely us'd : for the corruption of the betl
becomes the worst. When a clergyman is whipp'd, his gown
is first taken off, by which the dignity of his order is
cur'd: if he be wrongfully accus'd, he has his action of slan-
der; and 'tis at the poet's peril if he transgress the law.
But they will tell us that all kind of satire, tho' never
well deserv'd by particular priests, yet brings the whole or-
der into contempt. Is then ^e peerage of England anything
dishonor'd, when a peer suffers for his treason? If he "
libel'd or any way dcfam'd, he has his scandalum magnO'
lum" to punish the offender. They who use this Idnd
argument seem to be conscious to themselves of somewl
which has deserv'd the poet's lash, and are less concem'd foi
their public capacity than for their private; at least there U
pride at the bottom of their reasoning. If the faults of n
in orders are only to be judg'd among tliemselves, they i
all in some sort parties; for, since they say the honor
tneir order is concem'd in every member of it, how can
be sure that they will be impartial judges? How far I m^
be allow'd to speak my opinion in this case, I know not|
hut I am sure a dispute of this nature caus'd mischief it
abundance betwixt a king of England and an archbishop ol
Canterbury ;" one standing up for the laws of his land, aik
the other for the honor (as he call'd it) of God's Church:
which ended in the murther of the prelate, and in thi
whipping of his Majesty from post to pillar for his
*• A law term tor slander of a man of high unli, Involv
poniilimeat ttmn Dtdiniiy alandir. " lienor II. aad T
TO FABLES 173
The leam'd and ingenious Dr. Drake" has sav'd me the
labour of inquiring into the esteem and reverence which
Ac priests have had of old, and I would rather extend than
dimmish any part of it; yet I must needs say, that when a
priest provokes me without any occasion given him, I have
no reason, unless it be the charity of a Christian, to forgive
him: prior l<ssif is justification sufficient in the civil law.
If I answer him in bis own language, self-defense, I am
sure, must be allow'd me; and if I carry it farther, even to
a sharp recrimination, somewhat may be indulg'd to human
frailty. Yet my resentment has not wrought so far, but that
I have follow'd Chaucer in his character of a holy man, and
liave enlarg'd on that subject with some pleasure, reserving
to myself the right, if I shall tliink fit hereafter, to describe
another sort of priests, such as are more easily to be found
'than the Good Parson ; such as have given the last blow to
Christianity in this age. by a practice so contrary to their
doctrine. But this will keep cold till another time. In the
mean while I take up Chaucer where I left him. He must
have been a man of a most wonderful comprehensive nature,
because, as it has been truly observ'd of him, he has taken
info the compass of his Canterbury Tales the various man-
ners and humors (as we now call them) of the whole
English nation, in his age. Not a single character has
escap'd him. All his pilgrims are severally distinguish'd
from each other; and not only in their inclinations, but in
their very physiognomies and persons. Bapista Porta" could
not have describ'd their natures better, than by the marks
which the poet gives them. The matter and manner of
flieir tales, and of their telling, are so suited to their differ-
ent educations, humors, and callings, that each of them
would be improper in any other mouth, Even the grave
and serious characters are distinguish'd by their several
sorts of gravity : their discourses are such as belong to their
age, their calling, and their breeding; such as are becom-
ing of them, and of them only. Some of his persons are
vicious, and some virtuous; some are unlearn'd, or (as
Chaucer calls them) lewd, and some are learn'd. Even the
" Dr. James Drake wrols a reply to Jeremy Collier's Short Vim.
""H= did thEfir^i injury."
"A Neapolitui physicisa who wrote no phijaioeaoaij.
Ht JOHN DRTSBK
ribaldry of the Icnr cfaanwscra 15 different: Ae Reeve, the-
IdlDer. and the Cook are seveial men, and distinguish'd
from each otfacr, as utoch as the mincing Lady Prioresi
and the broad-fpeakin? gap-tooth'd Wife of Bath. But
om^fh of this: there is mch a rarietj of game springing
up before me. thai I am distracted in my choice, and laiov
cot vhich to follow. 'Tis sufficient to say, accoTding to
the proverb, that here is God's plenty. We have our fore*
fathers and great -grandames all before us, as they wei
Chaucer's days: their general characters are still remaining
in mankind, and even in England, ibo' they are call'd by
Other names than those of Monks and Friars, and Canons,
and Lady Abbesses, and Nuns: for mankind is ever the
same, and nothing lost out of nature, tho' everything
alter'd. May I have leave to do myself the justice — sinc«:
iny enemies will do me none, and are so far from grantii^
me to be a good poet, that they will not allow me
much as 10 be a Christian, or a moral man — may I have
leave, I say. to inform my reader that I have confin'd my
choice to such tales of Chaucer as savor nothing of
modesty. If I had desir'd more to please than to instruct
the Reeve, the Miller, the Shipman. the Merchant, th«
Sumner, and, above all, the Wife of Bath, in the prologue
to her tale, would have procur'd me as many friends and
readers, as there are beau;: and ladies of pleasure in the
town. But I will no more offend against good manners;
I am sensible, as I ought to be, of the scandal I have given
by my loose writings ; and make what reparation I am abl^
by this public acknowledgment. If anything of this oatur^
or of profaneness, be crept into these poems. I am so fae
from defending it, that I disown it. Tatum hoc indicium
nolo* Chaucer makes another manner of apology for hij
broad speaking, and Boccace makes the like; bat I will fol-
low neither of them. Our countryman, in the end of his
characters, before the Canterbury Tales, thus excuses th«
fibaldry, which is very gross in many of his novels:
Bat first, I pray yon of jrour conrteijr,
That ye ne arrele" it nought my vilUny,
Thoush that I plainly speak in this mattoe
• " 1 with «U tlii> aa&tid." " Rcckoik
TO FABLES JOS
To tellen yon her" words, and eke her cbere:
Ne [hougb I apeak her words properly,
For this ye Icnowen as well as I,
Who shall tellec a tale after a man,
He mote rehearse as nyc as ever he can:
Everich word of it been in bis charge.
AH spete he nin'er lo rudely ne targe.
Or else he mote telten his tale mitrue,
Or feine things, or find words new :
He may not spare, altbo he were hia brother.
He mote as well say o word as another.
Cfarist spake himself full broad in holy writ.
And well I wote no vitlany is it.
Eko Plato «3iib. who so can him rede,
The words mote" becai cousin to the dede."
Yet if a man should have enquir'd of Boccace or of
Chaucer, what need they had of introducing such char-
acters, where obscene words were proper in their mouths,
but very undecent to be heard; I know not what answer
they could have made: for that reason such tales shall be
left untold by me. You have here a specimen of Chaucer's
language, which is so obsolete that his sense is scarce to
be understood ; and you have likewise more than one ex-
ample of his unequal numbers, which were mention'd be-
fore. Yet many of his verses consist of ten syllables, and
the words not much behind our present English: as for
example, these two lines, in the description of the car-
penter's young wife:
I have almost done with Chaucer, when I have answer'd
some objections relating to my present work, I find some
people are offended that I have tum'd these tales into
modern English; because they think them unworthy of
my pains, and look on Chaucer as a dry, old-fashion'd wit,
not worth reviving. I have often heard the late Earl of
Leicester say that Mr. Cowley himself was of that opinion ;
who having read him over at my lord's request, declar'd
he had no taste of him. I dare not advance my opinion
*lv foyikii found (^uect rough.
* pasugE is enoDgb to explain
tn
JOmt DRTDEN
^
against the judgment of so great an author; tnit I thid:
it fair, however, to leave the decision to the public
Cowley was too modest to set up for a dictator; and bem{
shock'd perhaps with his old style, never examin'd into the
depth of his good sense. Chaucer, I confess, is a rough dis^
mond, and must first be polish'd, ere he shines. I deny nqt,.
lilfewise, that, living in our early days of poetry, he writs
not always of a piece, but sometimes mingles trivial things
with those of greater moment Sometimes also, tho' not often,
he runs riot, like Ovid, and knows not when he has said
enough. But there are more great wits, beside Chaucer,
whose fault is their excess of conceits, and those ill sorted.
An author is not to write all he can, but only all he ougbt
Having observed this redundancy in Chaucer, (as ii
easy matter for a man of ordinary parts to find a fault
in one of greater,) I have not tied myself to a literal trans-
lation ; but have often omitted what I judg'd unnecessarf,
or not of dignity enough to appear in the company of better
thoughts. I have presum'd farther, in some places, and added
somewhat of my own where I thought my author i
deficient, and had not given his thoughts their true luster,
for want of words in the beginning of our language. And
to this I was the more embolden'd, because (if I may b«
permitted to say it of myself) I found I had a soul c
genial to his, and that I had been conversant in the same
studies. Another poet, in another age, may take the same
liberty with my writings; if at least they live long enougll
to deserve correction. It was also necessary sometimes ta
restore the sense of Chaucer, which was lost or mangled
in the errors of the press. Let this example suffice ab
present; in the story of Falamon and ArcUe, where thtt
temple of Diana is describ'd, you find these verses, in
the editions of our author :
There saw I Dane turned nsto a tree,
I mean not the goddess Diane,
Bnt Venus daughter, which that bight Dani;
which after a little consideration I knew was to he refornrt
into this sense, that Daphne, the daughter of Pcnens, \
turn'd into a tree, I durst not make thus bold with Ovi^
TO FABLES
177
iried
lest some future Milbourne should arise, and say I
from my author, because I understood him not.
But there are other judges, who think I ought not to
lavc translated Chaucer into English, out of a quite con-
irary notion : they suppose there is a certain veneration
due to his old language ; and thai it is little less than profa-
nation and sacrilege to alter it. They are farther of opinion
that somewhat of his good sense will suffer in this trans-
fasion, and much of the beauty of his thoughts will in-
fallibly be lost, which appear with more grace in their old
habit. Of this opinion was that excellent person whom 1
mention'd, the late Earl of Leicester, who valued Chaucer
as much as Mr. Cowley despis'd him. My lord dissuaded
me from this attempt, ( for I was thinking of it some years
before his dealh,) and his authority prevail'd so far with
IBC as to defer my undertaking while he liv'd, in deference
to him: yet my reason was not convinc'd with what he
tirg'd against it. If the first end of a writer be to be
K~"~ ' Tstood, then as his language grows obsolete, his thoughts
quae nunc cecidere; cadentque,
int in lionore vocabula, si volet usus,
aibitrium est cl jus et norma loquend!.'*
len an ancient word for its sound and significancy de-
to be revived, I have that reasonable veneration for
antiquity, to restore it. All beyond this is superstition.
Words are not like landmarks, so sacred as never to be
remov'd ; customs are chang'd, and even statutes are silently
repeal'd, when the reason ceases for which they were en-
acted. As for the other part of the argument, that his
thoughts will lose of their original beauty, by the innova-
tion of words; in the first place, not only their beauty, but
their being is lost, where they are no longer understood,
which is the present case. I grant that something must be
lost in all transfusion, that is, in all translations ; but the
sense will remain, which would otherwise be lost, or at
JOBH DETDEX
t be WMin'i. when it is icarce tDttOigtUe; and that
to 2 few. How few arc there wbo cma read Chaucer so
Id tmit Mv aad hnv yrfcaJj t And if imperfectly, then
k loB pcoit aad no ploanrc Tts act for the use of
» oU Saxoa frieads tku I kavc taken these pains with
him: let tfceu n e^ e ct ^ vcnioB, because they have no
' of it. I Bsde it for tbcir salccs who understand sense
aad poKUj as well ta itacy, wbea that poetry and sense
b pot into words which tb^ aoderstand. I will go farther.
«Dd daic to atU, tbat what beauties I lose in some places,
I {tve to others which bad than act origtnallj ; but in this
I maj be partial to nrfsdl; let the reader jadge, and I sub-
nit to his decision. Yet I think I have just occasion to
canipUiii of theoi, wbo, because ihey understand Cbauccrj
woold deprire the greater pan of their countrymen of the
•ame adrantage, and board bin up, as misers do their
fraadam gold, only to IooIe on it diemsehres and hinder
others from making use of it. In sum, I seriously protest
that no man ever bad, or can bare, a greater veneration
for Chancer, than myself. I have translated some part of
his works, only that I might perpetuate his memory, or at
least refresh it, amongst my countrymen. If I have alter'd
him anywhere for the better, I must at the same time
acknowledge that I could have done nothing without him:
ftcilt «st inventis adiere^ is no great commendatioo ; and
I am not so vain to think I have deserv'd a greater. I will
conclude what I have to say of him singly, with this one
remark: a lady of my acquaintance, who keeps a kind of
correspondence with some authors of the fair sex tn France,
has been inform'd by them, that Mademoiselle de Scndery,
who is as old as Sibyl, and inspir'd like her by the same
God of Poetry, is at this time translating Chaucer into
modem French. From which 1 gather that he has been
formerly translated into the old Proven<;al {for how she
should come to understand old English I know not). But
the matter of fact being true, it makes me think that
there is something in it like fatality; that, after certain
periods of time, the fame and memory of great wits
should be renew'd, as Chaucer is both in France and
" " It i* euy 10 idd ta iri»t U already invented."
TO FABLES
EJand If this be wholly chance, 't is octraorditury, and
1 dare not call it more, for fear of being tax'd with
luperstition,
Boccace comes last to be consider'd, who living in the
same age with Chaucer, had the same genius, and follow'd
the same studies: both writ novels, and each of them culti-
vat'Cd his mother tongue. But the greatest resemblance of
our two modern authors being in their familiar style, and
pleasing way of relating comical adventures, I may pass it
over, because I have translated nothing from Boccace of
that nature. In the serious part of poetry, the advantage
is wholly on Chaucer's side; for tho' the Englishman has
fcorrow'd many tales from the Italian, yet it appears that
those of Boccace were not generally of his own making, but
'taken from authors of former ages, and by him only model'd;
^K) that what there was of invention in either of them may
be judg'd equal. But Chaucer has refin'd on Boccace, and
Xias mended the stories which he has borrow'd, in his way of
■telling; tho' prose allows more liberty of thought, and the
^expression is more easy when unconfin'd by numbers. Our
^countryman carries weight, and yet wins the race at dis-
^idvantage. I desire not the reader should take my word,
^and therefore I will set two of their discourses on the same
subject, in the same light, for every man to judge betwixt
"them. I translated Chaucer first, and, amongst the rest,
:iritch'd on The Wife of Bath's Talc; not daring, as I have
said, to adventure on her prologue, because 't is too licen-
tious: there Chaucer introduces an old woman of mean par-
entage, whom a youthful knight of noble blood was forc'd to
marry, and consequently loath'd her; the crone being in bed
with him on the wedding night, and finding bis aversion,
endeavors to win his affection by reason, and speaks a good
word for herself (as who could blame her?) in hope to
mollify the sullen bridegroom. Slie takes her topics from the
benefits of poverty, the advantages of old age and ugliness,
the vanity of youth, and the silly pride of ancestry and titles
without inherent virtue, which is the true nobility. When
I had clos'd Chaucer, I retum'd to Ovid, and translated some
more of his fables ; and by this time had so far forgott(
The Wife of Bath's Tale, that, when I took up Boccace,
;otten J
;cace, I
JOHN DRYDEN
unawares I feH on the same argument of preferring virtue
to nobility of blood, and titles, in the story of Sigismonda;
which I had certainly avoided for the resemblance of the
two discourses, if my memory had not fail'd me. Let the
reader weigh them both; and if he thinks roe partial to
Chaucer, 't is in him to right Boccacc
I prefer in our countryman, far above all liis other stories,
the noble poem of Palamon and Arcile, which is of the epic
kind, and perhaps not much inferior to the Ilias or the
£neis: the story is more pleasing than either of them, the
manners as perfect, the diction as poetical, the learning as
deep and various, and the disposition full as artful; only it
includes a greater length of time, as taking up seven years
at least; but Aristotle has left undecided the duration of the
action; which yet is easily reduc'd into the compass of a
year, by a narration of what preceded the return of Pala-
mon to Athens. I had thought for the honor of our nation,
and more particularly for his, whose laurel, tho' unworthy,
I have worn after him, that this story was of English'
growth, and Chaucer's own ; but I was undeceiv'd by Boe-
cace; for, casually looking on the end of his sevendt
Giomata, I found Dioneo (under which name he shadow^
himself) and Fiametta (who represents his mistress,
natural daughter of Robert, King of Naples), of whom tbeat
words are spoken: Dioneo c Fiametta gran pcssa cantaronc
insieme d' Arcita, e di Palamone :" by which it appears thai
this story was written before the time of Boccace; but, I'
name of its author being wholly lost, Chaucer is now becomi
an original ; and I question not but the poem has i
many beauties by passing thro' his noble hands. Beside)
this tale, there is another of his own invention, after tW
manner of the Provenqals, call'd The Flower and the Leaf*
with which I was so particularly pleas'd, both for the ini
tion and the moral, that I cannot hinder myself from r
mending it to the reader.
As a corollary to this preface, in which I have done justiei
to others, I owe somewhat to myself: not that I think i
worth my time to enter the lists with one M ," or out
" Dioneo and FUmetta sang logether a long lims of Arcile ar
■Not by Chauctr.
••Rev. take Milbourne, who hU attacked DrrdcD'i Virgil.
TO FABLES
191
B ," but barely to take notice, that such men there are
who have written scurrilously against me, without any
provocation, M , who is in orders, pretends amongst the
rest this quarrel to me, that 1 have fallen foul on priesthood:
if I have, I am only to ask pardon of good priests, and am
afraid his part of the reparation will come to little. Let
liim to satis6ed that he shall not be able to force himself
vpon me for an adversary. I contemn him too much to enter
into competition with him. His own translations of Virgi!
Jiave answer'd his criticisms on mine. If (as they say he
"las declar'd in print) he prefers the version of Ogleby to
mine, the world has made him the same compliment: for
't is agreed on all hands, that he writes even below Ogleby:
that, you will say, is not easily to be done ; but what cannot
M bring about? I am satisfied, however, that while he
and I live together, I shaU not be thought the worst poet of
the age. It looks as if I had desir'd him underhand to write
so ill against me; but upon my honest word I have not
brib'd him to do me this service, and am wholly guiltless of
his pamphlet. 'T is true, I should be giad if I could persuade
him to continue his good offices, and write such another
critique on anything of mine: for I find by experience he
has a great stroke with the reader, when he condemns any
of my poems, to make the world have a better opinion of
them. He has taken some pains with my poetry, but nobody
will be persuaded to take the same with his. If I had taken
to the Church, (as he affirms, but which was never in my
thoughts,) I should have had more sense, if not more grace,
than to have turn'd myself out of my benefice by writing libels
on ray parishioners. But his account of my manners and my
principles are of a piece with his cavils and his poetry; and
BO I have done with him for ever.
As for the City Bard, or Knight Physician, I hear his
quarrel to me is that I was the author of Absalom and
Achitophel, which, he thinks, is a little hard on his fanatic
patrons in London.
But I will deal the more civilly with his two poems, be-
cause nothing ill is to be spoken of the dead: and therefore
) BUctmoro, '
D bad cctiBurcd Drydm for tbe indeceocr
VMCc be to (be mirrr of las Arikmrs. I viQ odIj say ihat
it wu aoi for das boUc knight th«t I drew tbe plan of aa
<fic poem OB Kiac Aitinr. in taj preface to tbe tnuulatioo*
«f JovcBiL Tbe panltaa ancds of kiagdoBu were machiiM^
toe panderoai for biai to maHiacc: aod ibenfore be rejecte^^
tben, u Dares du] the whirlb«ts of Eiyx, wben tbey w«n
ti ii own before him by F-f""' Yet ftom that preface ll
plunly took his hint: for be be^aa anmeiSately opon tli
ctory, tbo' be bad ifae buoMss not to acknowledge l^s beni
factor but, instead of it. to tisdtice me in a libeL
I diall sajr tbe less of lir. Collier, because in many thinsf
be bas tax'd me jnstly; and I have pleaded guilty to aU
tfioasfati and exprcssioiis of nu»e which can be truly argued
of obscenity, pnifaneneo, of lamioralitT: and retract thenk
If he be n^ csony, let him trimnpfa : if he be my friend, at
I have given him no personal occasion to be otherwise, ha
win be glad of oiy rcpentaoce. It becomes me not to draw
Biy pea in tbe defense of a bad cause, wben I have so often
drawn it for a good one. Vet it were not difficult lo prove
dtat in many places be has perverted my meanii^ f^ hta
^ oi i e^ and interpreted my words into blasphemy and
bawdry, of which they were not goilty. Besides that, be is
toe much given to horseplay in bts raiDery, and comes to
battle like a dicutor from the plow. I will not say: "Tbe
seal of God's bonsc has eaten him ixp ;" hot I am sure it hai
devonr'd some part of his good manners and dvility. It
night also be doubted whether it were altogether zeal which
prompted him to this rough manner of proceeding: perhaps
it became not one of his function to rake into the rubbish at
ancient and modem plajrs : a di^Toe tnighl have employ'd hi<
pains to better purpose than in tbe nastiness of Plantus and
Aristophanes ; whose examples, as they excuse not me, so H
might be possibly suppos*d that he read them not without
some pleasure. They who have written commentaries OD
those poets, or on Horace, Juvenal, and Martial, have ex-
plained some vices which, without their interpretation, had
been unknown to modem times. Neither has he jui^d
partially betwixt the former age and us.
There is more bawdry in one play of Fletcher's, call'd
Tht Custom of Ok CotaUry, tban m all oars together. Yet
TO FABLES 183
this has been often acted on the stage in my remembrance.
Are the times so much more reform'd now than they were
five and twenty years ago? If they are, I congratulate the
amendment of our morals. But I am not to prejudice the
cause of my fellow poets, tho' I abandon my own defense:
they have some of them answered for themselves, and neither
they nor I can think Mr. Collier so formidable an enemy
that we should shun him* He has lost ground at the latter
end of the day, by pursuing his point too far, like the Prince
of Conde at the battle of Seneffe: from immoral plays to no
plays, ab abusu ad v,sum, non valet consequentia.^ But being
a party, I am not to erect myself into a judge. As for the
rest of those who have written against me, they are such
scQundrda that they deserve not the least notice to be taken
of thenu B ^ ■■ ■ and M are only distinguished from the
crowd by being remember'd to their infamy;
Demetri, t^ue Tigelli*'
Discipuloruxn inter jubeo plorare cathedras.
**"Th^ argument from abuse to use is not valid."
*^ " You, Demetrius and Tigellius, I bid lament amon^ the cfaairs ox jmtt
•ebolan.*' Bl|Mkmorc bad once been a scnoolmaster.— 'Nogrei.
PREFACE TO
JOSEPH ANDREWS
BV HENRY HELOiNG (1742)
Thk Comic Epic Ix Pxosb
AS IT a pMstble tbc mere Eoglisfa reader maf have a i^f- — '
l\ ferent idea of romance with tbe author of these Iktl^
-*--*- Tolianes ; and may conseqaenti; expect a kind of enter—
1 be foraid, nor which was even intended, in -
die following pages; it may not be improper to premise a
few words concerning this kind of writing, which I do not re-
■Bember to bare seen hitherto attempted in our language.
Tbe EPIC, as well as the DRAU,\, is divided into tragedy
and comedy. HOMER, who was tbe father of this species
of poetry, gave us the pattern of both these, tho' that of the
latter kind is entirely lost; which Aristotle tells us, bore the
tame relation to comedy which his Iliad bears to tragedy.
And perhaps, that we have no more instances of it among
tbe writers of antiquity, is owing to the loss of this great
pattern, which, had it survived, would have found its imi-
tators equally with the other poems of this great original.
And farther, as this poetry may be tragic or comic, I will
not scruple to say it may be likewise either in verse or prose;
for tho' it wants one particular, which the critic enumerates
in the constituent parts of an epic poem, namely, metre; yet,
when any kind of writing contains all its other parts, sncb
Rmrr nctdlng. dramatii
OTclil
t. and in
die. wu bor
n i>eu GUMon-
burr. SoiMt«l.[ii«, April :
and died
at Lirfwn. October 8. i:
'it
ThDUtfa
teldoni tpolun of
n MjayiM. Fi.
rfdiog Kalt.^t
ed tbroogh
novel.
> large number oE
deU
or detac
ions wUcb
«<i««I>
llr tutft. of wbici
; Epie in Pro«e," ii
b Ih.
:fac« to _ _ .
■■lo.erh An.
Jrewi," OB
tht
" Comic
novel wbidi it
inltodui
!ct w»» begun u a
'^''RiJhr"*"' '^'"'
.rdson'a "Pa
mela," and
tb»
pnrfKe
(l*e. Fielding-, con,
:epiii
>n of
thlj fotm of fiction.
TO JOSEPH ANDREWS US
as fable, action, characters, sentiments, and diction, and U
deficient in metre only, it seems, I think, reasonable to refer
it to the epic; at least, as no critic hath thought proper to
range it under any other bead, nor to assign it a particular
name to itself.
Thus the Teleraachus of the archbishop of Cambray ap-
I>ears to me of the epic kind, as well as the Odyssey of
Homer; indeed, it is much fairer and more reasonable to give
it a name common with that species from which it differs
only in a single instance, than to confound it with those
which it resembles in no other. Such are those voJuminoua
worits, commonly called Romances, namely Clelia, Cleopatra,
Astnea, Cassandra, the Grand Cyrus, and innumerable others
which contain, as I apprehend, very little instruction or en-
tertainment.
Now, a comic romance is a comic epic-poem in prose;
differing from comedy, as the serious epic from tragedy: its
action being more extended and comprehensive: containing
a much larger circle of incidents, and introducing a greater
variety of characters. It differs from the serious romance in
its fable and action, in this: that as in the one these are
grave and solemn, so in the other they are light and ridicu-
lous; it differs in its characters, by introducing persons of in-
feriourrank, and consequently of inferiour manners, whereas
the grave romance sets the highest before us : lastly in its sen-
timents and diction; by preserving the ludicrous instead of
*e sublime. In the diction I think, burlesque itself may be
sometimes admitted ; of which many instances will occur in
this work, as in the description of the battles, and some other
places not necessary to be pointed out to the classical reader ;
for whose entertainment those parodies or burlesque imita-
tions are chiefly calculated.
But tho' we have sometimes admitted this in our diction,
we have carefully excluded it from our sentiments and char-
acters; for there it is never properly introduced, unless in
writings of the I ;rlesque kind, which this is not intended to
be. Indeed, n-" two species of writing can differ more widely
than the comic and the burlesque : for as the latter is ever the
exhibition of what is monstrous and unnatural, and where
.d^ligh^ if we examine it, ariset from the surprising ab-
^
as HEKRT FIKLOrNa
tnrdity, as In appropriating the manners of the highest tt
the lowest, or ^ convtrso; so in the former, we should e
confine ourselves strictly to nature, from the just imitatioB
of which, will flow all the pleasure we can this way codvi^
to a sensible reader. And perhaps, there is one reason, wlq
a comic writer should of all others be the least excused fol
deviating from nature, since it may not be always e
for a serious poet to meet with the great and the admirable
but hfe everywhere furnishes an accurate observer with tl
ridiculous.
I have hinted this little, concerning burlesque; because 1
have often heard that name given to performances, whii*
have been truly of the comic kind, from the author's having
sometimes admitted it in his diction only ; which as it is d
dress of poetrj-, doth like the dress of men establish charac
ters, (the one of the whole poem, and the other of the whole
man), in vulgar opinion, beyond any of their greater excel-
lences: but surely, a certain drollery in style, where chan^
ters and sentiments are perfectly natural, no more constitute!
the burlesque, than an empty pomp and dignity of word^
where everything else is mean and low, can entitle any per*
formance to the appellation of the true sublime.
And I apprehend, my Lord Shaftesbury's opinion of inert
burlesque agrees with mine, when he asserts, " There is a
such thing to be found in the writings of the antients." But
perhaps I have less abhorrence than he professes for it;ai>4
that not because I have had some little success on the «aje
this way ; hut rather as it contributes more to exquisite mirih-
and laughter than any other; and these are probably n
wholesome physic for the mind, and conduce better to purgj
away spleen, melancholy, and ill affections, than is gen«rallf
imagined. Nay, I will appeal to common observatioii,
whether the sanie companies are not found more full of good'-
humour and benevolence, after they have been sweetened ft
two or three hours with entertainments of this kind, tha«
soured by a tragedy or a grave lecture.
But to illustrate all this by another science, in which, p
haps, we shall see the distinction more clearly and platalyt
let us examine the works of a comic hi story -painter, wMl
those performances which the Italians call Caricat%ra, «
TO JOSEPH ANDREWS
187
n find file greatest wtcellence of the former to consiat
Sk exactest copy of nature; insomuch, that a judicious
eye bastantly rejects anything outri; any liberty which
the painter hath taken with the features of that alpta
maler. Whereas in the Caricatura we allow all licence.
Iw aim is to exhibit monsters, not men; and all distor-
tions and exaggerations whatever are within its proper
province.
Now what Caricatura is in painting, Burlesque is in writ-
ing; and in the same manner the comic writer and painter
correlate to each other. And here I shall observe, that as in
the former, the painter seems to have the advantage; so it is
in the latter infinitely on the side of the writer: for the
Monstrous is much easier to paint than describe, and tht
Ridiculous to describe than paint.
And tho' perhaps this latter species doth not in either
science so strongly affect and agitate the muscles as the
Other; yet it will be owned. I believe, that a more rational and
useful pleasure arises to us from it. He who should call the
ingenious Hogarth a burlesque painter, would, in my opinion,
do him very little honour : for sure it is much easier, much
less the subject of admiration, to paint a man with a nose, or
any other feature of a preposterous size, or to expose him in
some absurd or monstrous attitude, than to express the affec-
tions of men on canvas. It hath been thought a vast com-
tnendation of a painter to say his figures seetrt to breathe;
but surely it is a much greater and nobler applause, thai they
appear to think.
But to return. The Ridiculous only, as I have before said,
falls within my province in the present work. Nor will some
explanation of this wurd be thought impertinent by the
reader, if he considers how wonderfully it hath been mis-
taken, even by writers who have profess'd it : for to what but
luch a mistake, can we attribute the many attempts to ridi-
cule the blackest villainies; and what is yet worse, the most
dreadful calamities? What could exceed the absurdity of an
author, who should write the comedy of Nero, with the
merry incident of ripping up his mother's belly; or what
would give a greater shodb to humanity than an attempt to
e the miseries of poverty and distress to ridicule i And
HENRY FIELDIKO
t, the reader will not want much learning to suggest s
instances to himself.
Besides, it may seem remarkable, that AristotU, who is SO
fond and free of definitions, hath not thought proper to de-
fine the Ridiculous. Indeed, where he tells us it is proper lo
comedy, he hath remarked that villainy is not its object: but
that he hath not, as I remember, positively asserted what is.
Nor doth the Abbe Bellegarde, who hath written a treatise
on this subject, tho' he shows us many species of it, once
trace it to its fountain.
The only source of the true Ridiculous (as it appears to
mc) is affectation. But tho' it arises from one spring only, ,
when we consider the in&nite streams into which this one s
branches, we shall presently cease to admire at the copious £
field it affords to an observer. Now affectation proceeds ^
from one of these two causes; vanity, or hypocrisy: for is^js *'
vanity puts us on affecting false characters, in order to pur — -xx-U^'
chase applause; so hypocrisy sets us on an endeavour to«:^j' "
avoid censure by concealing our vices under an appearances r>«^-ti'
of their opposite virtues. And tho" these two causes are^-rjs *
often confounded, (for they require some distinguishing;) (; "^S^S
yet, as they proceed from very different motives, so they are^-».^ *
as clearly distinct in their operations: for indeed, the affec — z:>-^lEi
tation which arises from vanity is nearer to truth than the^rl*
other; as it hath not that violent repugnancy of nature too* ^'
struggle with, wtiich that of the hypocrite hath. It may be^^dT "*0
likewise noted, that affectation doth not imply an absolute^J-C*!*^
negation of those qualities which are affected: and there — ^-»^«
fore, tho', when it proceeds from hypocrisy, ' ' ■..-— —
lied to deceit; yet when it comes from \
takes of the nature of ostentation: for in
tion of liberality in a vain man, differs visibly from the^srf*
same affectation in the avaricious; for tho' the vain man issi '^-'
not what he would appear, or hath not the virtue he affects,.^*^*^
to tlie degree he would he thought to have it; yet it sits less^s^**'
awkwardly on him than on the avaricious man, who is the^*** "
very reverse of what he would seem to be.
From the discovery of this affectation arises the Ridicu — k»^^»^
lous — which always strikes the reader with surprize 1 '"—
l>teaiare: and that in a higher and stronger degree when th«
e anectea: ana mere — =» ■_-—
ocrisy, it be nearly al — I.^ "^
m vanity only, it par — ~*-^*WQ
r instance, the affetta — .s^*^^*
TO JOSEPH ANDREWS
affectation arises from hypocrisy, than when from vanity:
tor to discover any one to be the exact reverse of what he
affects, is more surprizing, and consequently more ridiculous,
than to find him a little deficient in the quality he desires the
reputation of. 1 might observe that our Ben Jonson, who
of all men understood the Ridiculous the best, hath chieBy
used the hypocritical affectation.
Now from affectation only, the misfortunes and calamities
of life, or the imperfections of nature, may become the ob-
jects of ridicule. Surely he hath a very iU-framed mind, who
can look on ugliness, infirmity, or poverty, as ridiculous in '
themselves : nor do I believe any man living who meets a dirty
fellow riding through the streets in a cart, is struck with an
idea of the Ridiculous from it; but if he should see the same
figure descend from his coach and six, or holt from his chair
with his hat under his arm, he would then begin to laugh, and
with justice. In the same manner, were we to enter a poor
bouse and behold a wretched family shivering with cold and
languishing with hunger, it would not incline us to laughter,
(at least we must have very diabolical natures, if it would) :
but should we discover there a grate, instead of coals, adorned
with flowers, empty plate or china dishes on the side-board,
or any other affectation of riches and finery either on their
persons or in their furniture; we might then indeed be ex-
cused, for ridiculing so fantastical an appearance. Much less
are natural imperfections the object of derision: but when
ugliness aims at the applause of beauty, or lameness en-
deavours to display agility; it is then that these unfortunate
circumstances, which at first moved our compassion, tend
only to raise our mirth.
The poet carries this very far;
Where if the metre would suffer the word Ridiculous to close
the first line, the thought would be rather more proper.
Great vices are tlie proper objects of our detestation, smaller
faults of our pity: but affectalion appears to me the ouly true
source of the Ridiculous
But perhaps it may be objected to me, that I have «^inst
190 REKRT FIBLDING
my own rules introduced vices, and of a very black kind in'
this work. To this I shall answer : First, that it is very diffi
cult to pursue a series of human actions and keep dear fro;
them. Secondly, that the vices to be found here, are rath<
the accidental consequences of some human frailty, or foibl
than causes habitually existing in the mind. Thirdly, tha
they are never set forth as the objects of ridicule, but d
testation. Fourthly, that they are never the principal figur<
at that time on the scene ; lastly, they never produce the t
tended eviL
PREFACE TO THE
ENGLISH DICTIONARY
BY SAMUEL JOHNSON (I'/SS)
IT IS the fate of those who toi'-^t the lower employmentB
of life, to be rather driven tiy the fear of evil, than at-
tracted by the prospect of ^ood ; to be exposed to censure,
without hope of praise; to be disgraced by miscarriage, or
punished for neglect, wh/'.'e success would have been without
applause, and diligence wiihout reward.
Among these unhappy mortals is the writer of diction-
aries; whom mankind have considered, not as the pupil, but
the slave of science, the pioneer of literature, doomed only to
remove rubbish and clear obstructions from the paths
through which Learning and Genius press forward to con-
quest and glory, without bestowing a smile on the humble
drudge that facilitates their progress. Every other author
may aspire to praise ; the lexicographer can only hope to es-
cape reproach, and even this negative recompense has been
yet granted to very few.
I have, notwithstanding this discouragement, attempted
a Dictionary of the English Language, which, while it was
employed in the cultivation of every species of literature, has
itself been hitherto neglected; suffered to spread, under the
direction of chance, into wild exuberance; resigned to the
tyranny of time and fashion ; and exposed to the corruptions
of ignorance, and caprices of innovation.
For a Bkcteb of JobniDn's life, Me tbe inlroduction to "Life of Addi-
tion " in the Tolume ot English Essays. The Interert of bis prefBce ID
the grot DinioiUTT need liBrdljr be poialcd out, since the work itself li
s UDdmark in tbe hiitory of our language. The letter to Chc^teriteld, short
though It is. Is a docnnifnt of ?reat imporUine: In Ihe freeing of Utera-
tore from patronaBC, and ii in Itself a notable piece of litenlure. The
pTttaet to JohnKurs edition ot Stakeepeare'e plays not only explains the
editar'a cooeeptioD of his Xask. but canialns what Is perhaps tbe beet a^
preciatioa of tbe diunstiit wrilteo in the eigbieenlh centuij.
I
B SAMUEL JOHNSON
y/iter t took ihe first survey of <n>- undertaking. I found
6k;-.r sp«*" copious withom order, and energetic without rule:
whivrever ' turned niy view, there was perplexity to be dis-
entant,'[e<I a°^ confusion to be regulated; choice was to b«
made oi-'t of boundless variety, without any established prin-
ciple of soJeciion; adulterations were to be detected, withoot
a settled te.st of purity; and modes of expression to be r^
jected or received, without the suffrages of any writers of
classical reputat.ion or acknowledged authority.
Having therefoi^ "o assistance but from general grammar,
I applied myself to tbi; oerusal of our writers; and noting
whatever might be of use to ascertain or illustrate any
word or phrase, accumulated iti time the materials of a dic-
tionary, which, by degrees, I reduced to method, establishing
to myself, in the progress of thp work, such as experi-
ence and analogy suggested to me'.Texperience, which prac-
tice and observation were continually increasing; and anal-
ogy, which, though in some words obscure, was evident
in others.
In adjusting the Orthography, which has been to this
time unsettled and fortuitous, I found it necessary to dis-
tinguish those irregularities that are inherent in our tongue,
and perhaps coeval with it, from others which the ignorance
or negligence of later writers has produced. Every lan-
guage has its anomalies, which though inconvenient, and in
themselves once unnecessary, must be tolerated among ihc
imperfections of human things, and which require only to
be registered, that they may not be increased ; and ascer-
tained, that they may not be confounded: but every language
has likewise its improprieties and absurdities, which it i:
duty of the lexicographer to correct or proscribe.
As language was at its beginning merely oral, all w
of necessary or common use were spoken before they werC'i
written ; and while they were unfixed by any visible siga^~^
must have been spoken with great diversity, as we now oM
serve those who cannot read to catch sounds imperfectly, ani
utter them negligently. When this wild and barbarool
jargon was first reduced to an al^^babet, every penman e
deavored to express, as he could, the sounds which he was ai
1 to pronounce or to receive, and vitiated in writil
TO THE DICnONART 193
**»<;h words as were already vitiated in speech. The powers of
tirx^ iellers, when they were applied to a new language, must
^^ve been vague and unsettled, and therefore different hands
^v-ould exhibit the same sound by different combinations.
From this imcertain pronunciation arise in a great part the
^'■^rious dialects of the same country, which will always be
■^liserved to grow fewer, and less different, as books are
*^*=»ultiplie(]; and from this arbitrary representation of sounds
»>3f letters proceeds that diversity of spelling observable in
^'^e Saxon remains, and I suppose in the first books of every
■Nation, which perplexes or destroys analogy, and produce!
^*.»iomalous formations, which, being once incorporated can
*^«ver be afterward dismissed or reformed.
Of this kind are the derivatives length from /o«p, strength
"^rotn strong, darling from dear, breadth from broad, from
<^ry, drought, and from high, height, which Milton, in zeal
■^«r analogy, writes highth. ' Quid te exempta juvat spinis
^3e plnribus una?' To change all would be too much, and to
*^hange one is nothing.
This uncertainty is most frequent in the vowels, which are
^o capriciously pronounced, and so differentiy modified, by
accident or affectation, not only in every province, but in
^very mouth, that to them, as is well known to etymologists,
kittle regard is to be shown in the deduction of one language
Jrom another.
Such defects are not errors in orthography, but spots of
larbarity impressed so deep in the English language, that
criticism can never wash them away: these, therefore, must
"be permitted to remain untouched ; but many words have like-
wise been altered by accident, or depraved by ignorance, as
the pronunciation of the vulgar has been weakly followed;
and some still continue to be variously written, as authors
difl'er in their care or skill : of these it was proper to inquire
the true orthography, which I have always considered as
depending on their derivation, and have therefore referred
them to their original languages ; thus I write enchant, en-
chantment. enchanter, after the French, and incanlalio'n
after the Latin ; thus entire is chosen rather than intire, be-
cause it passed to us not from the Latin integer, but from
B ie Fremch entier.
^^■r [T) BC— Vol. s»
m
nuiciL ronKsoK
^
Of many words it is difficult to say whether they n
fmmediately received from the Latin or the French, since a
the time when we had dominions in France, we had Lalii
service in our churches. It is, however, my opinion t
the French generally supplied us; for we have few Latin
words, among the terms of domestic use, which are M
French; but many French, which are very remote froi
Latin.
Even in words of which the derivation is apparent, I bav
been often obliged to sacrifice uniformity to custom; thu
I write, in compliance with a numberless majority, coK«t_
and inveigh, deceit and receipt, fancy and phantom; soiM
times the derivative varies from the primitive, US esplak
and explanation, repeat and repetition.
Some combinations of letters having the same power, t
used indifferently without any discoverable reason of cboic^
as in choak, choke; soap, sope; fetuei, fuel, and many olberi;
which I have sometimes inserted twice, that those who seard)
for them under either form, may not search in vain.
In examining the orthography of any doubtful word, It
mode of spelling by which it is inserted in the scries of tt
dictionary, is to be considered as that to which I give, pe
haps not often rashly, the preference, 1 have left, in tl
examples, to every author his own practice unmoleited, thl
the reader may balance suffrages, and judge between Oi
but this question is not always to be determined by repuia
or by real learning; some men, intent upon greater things
have thought little on sounds and derivations; some, knoff
ing in the ancient tongues, have neglected those in which di
words are commonly to be sought. Thus Hammond t
fecibleness for feasibleness, because I suppose he ima^e
it derived immediately from the Latin; and some word!
such as dependant, dependent ; dependance, dependence, vai
their final syllable, as one or other language is present to ll
writer.
In this part of the work, where caprice has long wantone
without control, and vanity sought praise by petty reform*
tion, I have endeavored to proceed with a scholar's revereni
for antiquity, and a grammarian's regard to the genius ot W
tongue. I have attempted few alterations, and among tfau
TO THE DICTIONARY
fcw, perhaps the greater part is from the modern to the
ancient practice; and I hope I may be allowed to recommend
to those, whose thoughts have been perhaps employed too
anxiously on verba! singularities, not to disturb, upon nar-
row views, or for minute propriety, the orthography of their
fathers. It has been asserted, that for the law to be known,
h of more importance than to be right. ' Change,' says
Hooker, ' is not made without inconvenience, even from
worse to better.' There is in constancy and stability a gen-
eral and lasting advantage, which will always overbalance
the slow improvementB of gradual correction. Much lets
ought our written language to comply with the corruptions
of oral utterance, or copy that which every variation of
time or place makes different from itself, and imitate those
changes, which will again be changed, while imitation is
employed in observing them.
This recommendation of steadiness and uniformity does
not proceed from an opinion that particular combinations of
letters have much influence on human happiness; or that
truth may not be successfully taught by modes of spelling
fanciful and erroneous ; I am not yet so lost in lexicography
as to forget that 'words are the daughters of earth, and
that things are the sons of heaven.' Language is only the
instrument of science, and words are but the signs of ideas;
I vriah, however, that the instrument might be less apt to
decay, and that signs might be permanent, like the things
which they denote.
In settling the orthography, I have not wholly neglected
the pronunciation, which I have directed, by printing an ac-
cent upon the acute or elevated syllable. It will sometimes
be found that the accent is placed by the author quoted, on
a different syllable from that marked in the alphabetical
eeriea; it is then to be understood, that custom has varied,
or that the author has, in my opinion, pronounced wrong.
Short directions are sometimes given where the sound of
letters is irregular; and if they are sometimes omitted, defect
in such minute observations will be more easily excused, than
auperfluity.
In the investigation, both of the orthography and signifi-
ution of words, their Etymology was necessarily to be £«•
SAMUEL JOHNSON
sidered, and they were therefore to be divided into primitives
and derivatives. A primitive word is that which can
traced no further to any English root; thus circumspect,
circuinveMl, circumstance, delude, concave, and complicate,
though compounds in the Latin, are to us primitives. De-
rivatives, are all those that can be referred to any word in
English of greater simplicity.
The derivatives I have referred to their primitives, with
an accuracy sometimes needless ; for who does not see tbat
remoteness comes from remote, lovely from love, concavity
from concave, and demonstrative from demonstrate? But
this grammatical exuberance the scheme of my work did not
allow me to repress. It is of great importance, in examin-
ing the general fabric of a language, to trace one word from
another, by noting the usual modes of derivation and inflec-
tion; and uniformity must be preserved in systematical
works; though sometimes at the expense of particular
propriety.
Among other derivatives I have been careful to insert
and elucidate the anomalous plurals of nouns and preterites
of verbs, which in the Teutonic dialects are very frequent,
and, though familiar to those who have always used them,
interrupt and embarrass the learners of our language.
The two languages from which our primitives have been
derived, are the Roman and Teutonic: under the Roman, 1
comprehend the French and provincial tongues; and under
the Teutonic, range the Saxon, German, and all their kindred
dialects. Most of our polysyllables are Roman, and our
words of one syllable are very often Teutonic.
In assigning the Roman original, it has perhaps soi
times happened that I have mentioned only the Latin, when
the word was borrowed from the French; and considering
myself as employed only in the illustration of my □
language, I have not been very careful to observe whether
the Latin would be pure or barbarous, or the French elegant
or obsolete.
For the Teutonic et)Tnologies, I am commonly indebted to
Junius and Skinner, the only names which I have forborne
to quote when I copied their books ; not that I might appro-
priate their labors or usurp their honors, but that I mi^it
TO THE DICTIOKAKT 197
spare perpetual repetition by one general acknowledgment.
Of these, whom I ought not to mention but with the rever-
ence due to instructors and benefactors, Junius appears to
have excelled in extent of learning, and Skinner in recti-
tude of understanding. Junius was accurately skilled in all
the northern languages, Skinner probably examined the
ancient and remoter dialects only by occasional inspection
into dictionaries; but the learning of Junius is often of no
other use than to show him a track by which he may deviate
from his purpose, to which Skinner always presses forward
by the shortest way. Skinner is often ignorant, but never
ridiculous: Junius is always full of knowledge; but his
variety distracts his judgment, and his learning is very
frequently disgraced by his absurdities.
The votaries of the northern muses will not perhaps
easily restrain their indignation, when they find the name
of Junius thus degraded by a disadvantageous comparison;
but whatever reverence is due to his diligence, or his attain-
ments, it can be no criminal degree of censoriousness to
charge that etymologist with want of judgment, who can
seriously derive dream from drama, because 'life is a
drama and a drama is a dream'; and who declares with a
tone of defiance, that no man can fail to derive moan from
fi6viii, monos, single or solitary, who considers that grief
naturally loves to be alone.
Our knowledge of the northern literature is so scanty,
that of words undoubtedly Teutonic, the original is not
always to be found in an ancient language; and I have
therefore inserted Dutch or German substitutes, which I
consider not as radical, but parallel, not as the parents, but
sisters of the English.
The words which are represented as thus related by
descent or cognation, do not always agree in sense; for it
is incident to words, as to their authors, to degenerate from
their ancestors, and to change their manners when they
change their country. It is sufficient, in etymological in-
quiries, if the senses of kindred words be found such as
may easily pass into each other, or such as may both be
referred to one general idea.
The etymology, so far as it is yet known, was easily found
SAHUBL Jt}HN90N
ib the volumes, where it is particularly and professedly c3^
livered; and, by proper attention to the rules of derivatio*^
the orthography was soon adjusted. But to collect t:hb
woiiis of our language was a task of greater difficulty: the
deficiency of dictionaries was immediately apparent; and
when liiey were exhausted, what was yet wanting must T
sougtit by fortuitous and unguided excursions into boolo
and gleaned as industry should find, or chance should offef
it. in the boundless chaos of a living speech. My seard^
however, has been either skilful or lucky; for I have much
augmented the vocabulary.
As my design was a dictionary, common or appellative, I
have omitted all words which have relation to proper names;
such as Arian, Soanian, CaMnisl, Benedictine, MahomelaHi
but have retained those of a more general nature, i
Heathen, Pagan.
Of the terms of art I have received such as could 1
found either in books of science or technical dictionaries}
and have often inserted, from philosophical writerB, word(
which are supported perhaps only by a single authority, ul4
which, being not admitted into general use, stand yet as c
didates or probationers, and must depend for their adoptica
on the suffrage of futurity. The words which our authort
have introduced by their knowledge of foreign languages, a
ignorance of their own, by vanity or wantonness, by (
pliance with fashion or lust of innovation, I have registered
as they occurred, though commonly only to censure thed^
and warn others against the folly of naturalizing uselees for*
eigncrs to the injury of the natives,
I have not rejected any by design, merely because thq
were unnecessary or exuberant; but have received thoU
which by different writers have been differently formed, a!
viscid, and viscidity, viscous, and viscosity.
Compounded or double words I have seldom noted, excep
when they obtain a signification different from that whtdl
the components have in their simple state.
Thus highvrayman, woodman, and horsecourser, require
an explanation; but of tkiefiike; or coachdriver, no notid
was needed, because the primitives contain the meaaing c
tht compounds.
TO THE DICTIONARY UO
Words arbitrarily formed by a constant and settled
■analogy, like diminutive adjectives in ish, as greenish,
bluish; adverbs in ly, aa duUy, openly; substantives in ness,
as vileness, faulliness; were less diligently sought, and many
sometimes have been omitted, when I had no authority that
invited me to insert them; not that they are not genuine, and
regular offsprings of English roots, but because their relation
to the primitive being always the same, their signification
cannot be mistaken.
The verbal nouns in iug, such as the keeping of the castle,
the leading of the army, are always neglected, or placed only
to illustrate the sense of the verb, except when they signify
things as well as actions, and have therefore a plural num-
I ber, as dwelling, living; or have an absolute and abstract
j signification, as caloririg, painting, learning.
I The participles are likewise omitted, unless, by signifying
I rather habit or quality than action, they take the nature of
adjectives; as a thinking man, a man of prudence; a pacing
] horse, a horse that can pacer these I have ventured to call
participial adjectives. But neither are these always inserted,
because they are commonly to be understood without any
I danger of mistake, by consulting the verb.
Obsolete words are admitted when they are found in
I anthors not obsolete, or when they have any force or beauty
tliat mpy deserve revival.
As composition is one of the chief characteristics of S
language, I have endeavored to make some reparation for
the universal negligence of my predecessors, by inserting
great numbers of compounded words, as may be found un-
der after, fore, new, night, fair, and many more. These,
numerous as they are, might be multiplied, but that use and
curiosity are here satisfied, and the frame of our language
and modes of our combination amply discovered.
i Of some forms of composition, such as that by which re
ia prefixed to note repetition, and «n to signify contrariety or
privation, all the examples cannot be accumulated, because
the use of these particles, if not wholly arbitrary, is so little
tiniited, that they are hourly affixed to new words as occasion
tequires, or is imagined to require them.
^^^Xbcre is another kind of composition more frequent in
' 200
SAMimL JOHNSON
^
our language than perhaps in any other, from which arises
to foreigners ihc greatest difficulty. We modify the signi-
fication of many verbs by a particle subjoined; as to
off, to escape by a fetch ; to fail on, to attack : fall og, to
apostatize; to break off, to stop abruptly; to bear out, to
jtjstify; lo fall in, to comply; to give over, lo cease; t
off, to embellish; to set in, to begin a continual tenor; to tet
out, to begin a course or journey ; to lake off, to copy ; with
innumerable expressions of the same kind, of which soma
appear wildly irregular, being so far distant from the s
of the simple words, that no sagacity will be able to trace
the steps by which they arrived at the present use. These 1
have noted with great care ; and though I cannot flatter my-
self that the collection is complete, I believe I have so far
assisted the students of our language that this kind of phrase-
ology will be no longer insuperable; and the combinations
of verbs and particles, by chance omitted, will be easily ex-
plained by comparison with those that may be foimd.
Many words yet stand supported only by the name of.
Bailey, Ainsworth, Philips, or the contracted Did. for Die*
lionaries, subjoined; of these I am not always certain that
they are read in any book but the works of lexicographers*
Of such I have omitted many, because I had never
them; and many I have inserted, because they may perhaps
exist, though they have escaped my notice: they are, how-
ever, to be yet considered as resting only upon the credit of
former dictionaries. Others, which I considered as useful, or
know to be proper, though I could not at present support
them by authorities, I have suffered to stand upon my own
attestation, claiming the same privilege with my predeces-.
sors, of being sometimes credited without proof.
The words, thus selected and disposed, are grammatically
considered; they are referred to the different parts of speech;
traced when they are irregularly inflected, through their
various terminations; and illustrated by observations, not
indeed of great or striking importance, separately considered,
but necessary to the elucidation of our language, and hitherto
neglected or forgotten by English grammarians.
That part of my work on which I exoect malignity most
frequently to fasten, is the exflakatioh ; in which I cannot
TO THE DICTIONAHT
^^^P^te to satisfy those, who are perhaps not inclined to be
^^^^leased, since I have not always been able to satisfy myself.
To interpret a language by itself is very difficult ; many words
cannot be explained by synonimes, because the idea signi-
fied by them has not more than one appellation ; nor by par-
aphrase, because simple ideas cannot be described. When
the nature of things is unknown, or the notion unsettled and
indefinite, and various in various minds, the words by which
such notions are conveyed, or such things denoted, will be
ambiguous and perplexed. And such is the fate of hapless
lexicography, that not only darkness, but light impedes and
distresses it; things may be not only too little, but too much
known, to be happily illustrated. To explain, requires the
use of terms less abstruse than that which is to be explained,
and such terras cannot always be found; for as nothing can
be proved but by supposing something intuitively known,
and evident without proof, so nothing can be defined but by
the use of words too plain to admit a definition.
Other words there are, of which the sense is too subtle
and evanescent to be fixed in a paraphrase ; such are all those
which arc by the grammarians termed expletives, and, in
dead languages, are suffered to pass for empty sounds, of no
Other use than to fill a verse, or to modulate a period, but
which are easily perceived in living tongues to have power
and emphasis, though it be sometimes such as no other form
of expression can convey.
My labor has likewise been much increased by a class
o! verbs too frequent in the English language, of which
the signification is so loose and general, the use so vague
and indeterminate, and the senses detorted so widely from
the first idea, that it is hard to trace them through the
maze of variation, to catch them on the brink of utter
inanity, to circumscribe them by any limitations, or in-
terpret them by any words of distinct and settled mean-
ing ; such are bear, break, come, cast, full, get, give, do, put,
let, go, ruK. make, take, turn, throw. If of these the
whole power is not accurately delivered, it must be re-
membered, that while our language is yet living, and vari-
able by the caprice of every one that speaks it, these words
are hourly shifting their relations, and can no more be as-
eertained in « dictionary, than a grove, in the agltatioa
of a storm, can be accurately delineated from ita picture
in the water.
The particles are among all nations applied with so great
latitude, that they are not easily reducible under any regular
scheme of explication: this difficulty is not less, nor per-
haps greater, in English, than in odier languages, I have
labored them with diligence, I hope with success; such at
least as can be expected in a task, which no man, however
learned or sagacious, has yet been able to perform.
Some words there are which I cannot explain, because
I do not understand them ; these might have been omitted
very often with little inconvenience, but I would not so
far indulge my vanity as to decline this confession : for
when Tully owns himself ignorant whether lesats, in the
twelve tables, means a funeral song, or tnottrning gartntnt;
and Aristotle doubts whether oiipcuv in the Iliad signifies
a mule, or muleteer, I may surely without shame, leave
some obscurities to happier industry, or future information.
The rigor of interpretative lexicography requires that
tke explanation, and the word explained should be always
reciprocal; this I have always endeavoured, but could not
always attain. Words arc seldom exactly synonymous; a
new term was not introduced, but because the former was
thought inadequate: names, therefore, have often many
ideas, but few ideas have many names. It was then neces-
sary to use the proximate word, for the deficiency of
single terms can very seldom be supplied by circumlocu-
tion; nor is the inconvenience great of such mutilated in-
terpretations, because the sense may easily be collected
entire from the examples.
In every word of extensive use, it was requisite to mark
the progress of its meaning, and show by what grada-
tions of intermediate sense it has passed from its primitive
to its remote and accidental signification; so that every
foregoing explanation should tend to that which follows,
and the series be regularly concatenated from the first
notion to the last.
This is specious, but not always practicable; kindred
■enses may be so interwoven, that the perplexity caooot
TO THE DlCnOKART 108
he disentangled, nor any reason be assigned why one should
be ranged before the other. When the radical idea branchei
out into parallel ramifications, how can a consecutive series
be formed of senses in their nature collateral ? The shades
of meaning sometimes pass imperceptibly into each other,
so that though on one side they apparently differ, yet it
is impossible to mark the point of contact. Ideas of the
same race, though not exactly alike, are sometimes so little
different, that no words can express the dissimilitude, though
the mind easily perceives it when they are exhibited to-
gether; and sometimes there is such a confusion of ac>
ceptations, that discernment is wearied and distinction put-
zled, and perseverance herself hurries to an end, by crowd-
ing together what she cannot separate.
These complaints of difhculty will, by those that have
never considered words beyond their popular use, be thought
only the jargon of a man willing to magnify his labors, and
procure veneration to his studies by involution and obscurity.
But every art is obscure to those that have not learned it;
this uncertainty of terms, and commixture of ideas, is well
known to those who have joined philosophy with grammar;
and if I have not expressed them very clearly, it must be
remembered that I am speaking of that which words are
insufficient to explain.
The original sense of words is often driven out of use
by their metaphorical acceptations, yet must he inserted for
the sake of a regular origination. Thus I know not whether
ardor is used for material heat, or whether flagrant, in &l-
glish, ever signifies the same with burning; yet such are the
primitive ideas of these words, which are therefore set
first, though without examples, that the figurative senses
may be commodiously deduced.
Such is the exuberance of signification which many words
have obtained, that it was scarcely possible to collect all
their senses ; sometimes the meaning of derivatives must
be sought in the mother term, and sometimes deficient ex-
planations of the primitive may be supplied in the train
of derivation. In any case of doubt or difficulty, it will
be always proper to examine all the words of the same race;
lor some words are slightly passed over to avoid repetition.
SAMUEL JOHNSON
some admitted easier and clearer explanation than others,
and all will be better understood, as they are considered
in greater variety of structures and relations.
All the interpretations of words are nol written with the
same skill, or the same happiness: things equally easy in
themselves, are not all equally easy to any single mind.
Every writer of a long word commits errors, where there
appears neither ambiguity to mislead, nor obscurity to con-
found him; and in a search like this, many felicities of ex-
pression will be casually overlooked, many convenient paral-
lels will be forgotten, and many particulars will admit im-
provement from a mind utterly unequal to the wliole per-
formance.
But many seeming faults are to be imputed rather to the
nature of the undertaking, than the negligence of the per-
former. Thus some explanations are unavoidably reciprocal
or circular, as hind, the female of the stag; Jtag, the male of
the kind: sometimes easier words arc changed into harder,
as burial into sepulture, or interment, drier into desiccative.
dryness into siccity or aridity, fit into paroxysm; for the
easiest word, whatever it be, can never be translated into
one more easy. But easiness and difficulty are merely rel-
ative; and if the present prevalence of our language should
invite foreigners to this Dictionary, many will be assisted
by (hose words which now seem only to increase or produce
obscurity. For this reason I have endeavoured frequently
to join a Teutonic and Roman interpretation, as to cheer,
to gladden or exhilarate, that every learner of English may
be assisted by his own tongue.
The solution of all difficulties, and the supply of all de-
fects must be sought in the examples, subjoined to the vari-
ous senses of each word, and ranged according to the time
of their authors.
When I first collected these authorities, I was desirous
that every quotation should be useful to some other end
than the illustration of a word; I therefore extracted from
philosophers principles of science; from historians remark-
able facts ; from chymists complete processes ; from divines
striking exhortations; and from poets beautiful descriptions.
Such is design, while it is yet at a distance from execution.
TO THE DICTIONARY 305
When the time called upon me to range this accumulation
of elegance and wisdom into an alphabetical scries, I soon
discovered that the bulk of my volumes would fright away
the student, and was forced to depart from my scheme of
including all that was pleasing or useful in English litera-
ture, and reduce my transcripts very often to clusters of
words, in which scarcely any meaning is retained; thus to
the weariness of copying, I was condemned to add the vexa-
tion of expunging. Some passages I have yet spared, which
may relieve the labor of verbal searches, and intersperse
with verdure and flowers the dusty desarts of barren
philology.
The examples, thus mutilated, are no longer to be con-
sidered as conveying the sentiments or doctrine of their
authors; the word for the sake of which they are inserted,
with all its appendant clauses, has been carefully preserved;
Jmt it may sometimes happen, by hasty detruncation, that
the general tendency of the sentence may be changed: the
divine may desert his tenets, or the philosopher his system.
Some of the examples have been taken from writers who
were never mentioned as masters of elegance, or models of
style; but words must be sought where they are used; and in
what pages, eminent for purity, can terms of manufacture or
agriculture be found? Many quotations serve no other pur-
pose than that of proving the bare existence of words, and are
therefore selected with less scrupulousness than those which
are to teach their structures and relations.
My purpose was to admit no testimony of living authors,
that I might not he misled by partiality, and that none of
my contemporaries might have reason to complain; nor
have I departed from tliis resolution, but when some per-
formance of uncommon excellence excited my veneration,
when my memory supplied me, from late books, with an
example that was wanting, or when my heart, in the tender-
ness of friendship, solicited admission for a favorite name.
So far have I been from any care to grace my pages with
modern decorations, that I have studiously endeavored to
collect examples and authorities from the writers before
the Restoration, whose works I regard as the 'wells of En-
glish undefiled,' as the pure sources of genuine diction. Our
, JOHNSON
language, for almost a century, has, by the concurrence ol
inany causes, been gradually departing from its original
Teutonic character and deviating towards a Gallic structure
and phraseology, from which it ought to be our endeavor
to recall it, by making our ancient volumcB the ground-
work of style, admitting among the additions of later times,
only such as may supply real deficiencies, such as are readily
adopted by the genius of our tongue, and incorporate easily
with our native idioms.
But as every language has a time of rudeness antecedent
to perfection, as well as of false refinement and declension,
I have been cautious lest my zeal for antiquity might drive
me into times too remote, and crowd my book with words
now no longer understood. I have fixed Sidney's work
for the boundary, beyond which I make few excursions,
From the authors which rose in the time of Eliiabeth, a
speech might be formed adequate to all the purposes of use
and elegance. If the language of theology were extracted
from Hooker and the translation of the Bible; the terms
of natural knowledge from Bacon; the phrases of policy,
war, and navigation from Raleigh; the dialect of poetry
and fiction from Spenser and Sidney; and the diction of
common life from Shakespeare, few ideas would be lost
to mankind, for want of English words in which they might
be expressed.
It is not sufficient that a vrord is found, unless it be so
combined as that its meaning is apparently determined by
the tract and lenor of the sentence; such passages I have
therefore chosen, and when it happened that any author
gave a definition of a term, or such an explanation as ia
equivalent to a definition. I have placed his authority as a
supplement to my own, without regard to the chronological
order that is otherwise observed.
Some words, indeed, stand unsupported by any authority,
but they are commonly derivative nouns or adverbs, formed
from their primitives by regular and constant analogy, or
names of things seldom occurring in books, or words of
which I have reason to doubt the existence.
There fs more danger of censure from the multiplicity
than paucity of examples; authorities will sometimes leeni
to kive b«en accumulated without necessity or use, and per-
haps some will be found, which might, without loss, have
been omitted. But a work of this kind is not hastily to be
charged with superfluitiea; tbose quotations, which to care-
less or unskillful perusers appear only to repeat the same
saise, will often exhibit, to a more accurate examiner,
diversities of signification, or, at least, afford different
shades of the same meaning: one will show the word ap-
plied to persons, another to things; one will express an ill,
another a good, and a third a neutral sense; one will prove
the expression genuine from an ancient author; another will
show it elegant from a modern: a doubtful authority is
corroborated by another of more credit; an ambiguous sen-
tence is ascertained by a passage clear and determinate: the
word, how often soever repeated, appears with new as-
sociates and in different combinations, and every quotation
contributes something to the stability or enlargement of the
language.
When words are used equivocally, I receive them in
either sense; when they are metaphorical, I adopt them in
their primitive acceptation.
I have sometimes, though rarely, yielded to the temptation
of exhibiting a genealogy of sentiments, by showing how
one author copied the thoughts and diction of another; such
quotations are indeed little more than repetitions, which
might justly be censured, did they not gratify the mind,
by affording a kind of intellectual history.
The various syntactical structures occurring in the ex-
amples have been carefully noted; the license or negligence
with which many words have been hitherto used, has made
our style capricious and indeterminate; when the different
combinations of the same word are exhibited together, the
preference is readily given to propriety, and I ha\'e often
endeavored to direct the choice.
Thus have I labored by settling the orthography, display-
ing the analogy, regulating the structures, and ascertaining
the signification of English words, to perform all the parts
of a faithful lexicographer: but I have not always executed
my own scheme, or satisfied my own expectations. The
work, whatever proofs of diligence and attention it may ex-
SAMUEL JOHNSON
hibit, is yet capable of many improvements: the ortliography
wbich I recommend is stUI controvertible; the etymology
which 1 adopt is uncertain, and perhaps frequently er-
roneous; the explanations are sometimes too much con-
tracted, and sometimes too much diffused, the significations
are distinguished rather with subtlety than skill, and the at-
tention is harassed with unnecessary minuteness.
The examples are too often injudiciously truncated, and
perhaps sometimes — I hope very rarely — alleged in a mis-
taken sense; for in making this collection I trusted more
to memory, than, in a state of disquiet and embarrassment,
memory can contain, and purposed to supply at the review
what was left incomplete in the first transcription.
Many terms appropriated to particular occupations, though
necessary and significant, are undoubtedly omitted ; and of
the woris most studiously considered and exemplified, many
senses have escaped observation.
Yet these failures, however frequent, may admit extenua-
tion and apology. To have attempted much is always laud-
able, even when the enterprise is above the strength that
undertakes it: to rest below his own aim is incident to
every one whose fancy is active, and whose views are com-
prehensive; nor is any man satisfied with himself because
he has done much, hut because he can conceive little. When
first I engaged in this work, I resolved to leave neither
words nor things unexamined, and pleased myself with a
prospect of the hours which I should revel away in feasts
of literature, the obscure recesses of northern learning
which I should enter and ransack, the treasures with which
I expected every search into those neglected mines (o re-
ward my labor, and the triumph with which I should display
my acquisitions to mankind. When I had thus inquired into
' the original of words, I resolved to show likewise my atten-
tion to things; to pierce deep into every science, to inquire
the nature of every substance of which I inserted the name,
to limit every idea by a definition strictly logical, and ex-
hibit every production of art or nature in an accurate de-
scription, that my book might be in place of all other
dictionaries whether appellative or technical. But these
were the dreams of a poet doomed at last to wake a
\ .
i
TO THE DICTTONART
Imkogrspher. I soon found that it is too late to look for
inslr-unetits, when the work calls for execution, and that
whatever abilities I had brought to my task, with those I
must finally perform it To deliberate whenever I doubted,
to inquire whenever 1 was ignorant, would have protracted
the undertaking without end, and, perhaps, without much
improvemeot ; for I did not find by my first experiments,
that what I had not of my own was easily to be obtained:
I saw tliat one inquiry only gave occasion to another, that
book referred to book, that to search was not always to find,
and to find was not always to be informed; and that thus
to pursue perfection, was, like the first inhabitants of Ar-
cadia, to chase the sun, which, when they had reached the
hill where he seemed to rest, was still beheld at the same
distance from them.
I then contracted my design, determining to confide in
myself, and no longer to solicit auxiliaries which produced
more incumbrance than assistance ; by this I obtained at
least one advaniage, that I set limits to my work, which
would in time be ended, though not completed.
Despondency has never so far prevailed as to depress me
to negligence; some faults will at last appear to be the
effects of anxious diligence and persevering activity. The
nice and subtle ramifications of meaning were not easily
avoided by a mind intent upon accuracy, and convinced of
the necessity of disentangling combinations, and separating
similitudes. Many of the distinctions which to common
readers appear useless and idle, will be found real and im-
portant by men versed in the school philosophy, without
which no dictionary can ever be accurately compiled, or
skillfully examined.
Some senses, however, there are, which, though not the
same, are yet so nearly allied, that they are often con-
founded. Most men think indistinctly, and therefore can-
not speak with exactness ; and consequently some examples
might be indifferently put to either signification: this un-
certainty is not to be imputed to me, who do not forra, but
register the language; who do not teach men how they
should think, but relate how they have hitherto expressed
their thoughts.
8AUUEL JOHNSON
N
N
The imperfect sense of some examples I Tamentei]. fcutJ
could not remedy, and hope they will be compensated bjM
innumerable passages selected with propriety, and preserved^
with exactness; some shining with sparks of imagiiiatii)il,>I
and some replete with treasures of wisdom.
The orthography and etymology, though imperfect, are 1
not imperfect for want of care, but because care wiU not
always be successful, and recollection or information come
too late for use.
That many terms of art and manufacture are omitted,
must he frankly acknowledged; but for this defect I way
boldly allege that it is unavoidable; I could not visit cavems,'
to learn the miner's language, nor take a voyage to perfect
my skill in the dialect of navigation, nor visit the ware*
houses of merchants, and shops of artificers, to gain th|
names of wares, tools, and operations, of which no meatimi
is found in books; what favorable accident or easy inquiry
brought within my reach, has not been neglected; but it
had been a hopeless labor to glean up words, by courtin*
living information, and contesting with the sullenness o:
one, and the roughness of another.
To furnish the Academicians delta Cruica with words of
this kind, a series of comedies called La Fiera, or The Pair,
was professedly written by Buonaroti; but 1 had no s
assistant, and therefore was content to want what the]
must have wanted likewise, had they not luckily been ;
supplied.
Nor arc all words which are not found in the vacKba
lary, to be lamented as omissions. Of the laborious aiu
mercantile part of the people, the diction is in a gre4(
measure casual and mutable; many of their terms
formed tor some temporay or local convenience, and thou^
current at certain times and places, are in others utterly
unknown. This fugitive cant, which is always in a
of increase or decay, cannot be regarded as any part of lh5
durable materials of a language, and therefore must bfl
STiffered to perish with other things unworthy of preser>
valion.
Care will sometimes betray to the appearance of negll*
gence. He that is catching opportunities which sddga|
TO THE DICTIONARY tit
, will sufifer those to pass by unregarded, which he
CxpeciB hourly to return; he that is searching for rare and
remote things, will neglect those that arc obvious and fa-
miliar : thus many of the most common and cursory words
have been inserted with little illustration, because in gath-
ering the authorities, I forebore to copy those which I
thought likely to occur whenever they were wanted, It is
remarkable that, in reviewing my collection, I found the
word sea unexemplified.
Thus it happens, that in things difficult there is danger
from ignorance, and in things easy, from confidence ; ths
mind, afraid of greatness, and disdainful of littlenesi,
hastily withdraws herself from painful searches, and passes
with scornful rapidity over tasks not adequate to her pow-
*rs ; sometimes too secure for caution, and again too anxious
for vigorous effort; sometimes idle in a plain path, and
sometimes distracted In labyrinths, and dissipated by dif-
fercnt intentions.
A large work is difficult because it is large, even though
%ll its parts might singly be performed with facility; wher«
Uierc are many things to be done, each must be allowed its
share of time and labor, in the proportion only which it
beara to the whole; nor can it be expected, that the stones
which form the dome of a temple, should be squared and
polished like the diamond of a ring.
Of the event of this work, for which, having labored it
with so much application, I cannot but have some degree
of parental fondness, it is natural to form conjectures,
Tbose who have been persuaded to think well of my de-
sign, will require that it should fix our language, and put
a stop to those alterations which time and chance have
hitherto been suffered to make in it without opposition.
With this consequence I will confess that I flattered myself
for a while; but now begJn to fear that I have indulged
expectation which neither reason nor experience can justify.
When we see men grow old and die at a certain time one
after another, from century to century, we laugh at the elixir
that promises to prolong life to a thousand years; and with
equal justice may the lexicographer be derided, who being
able to produce no example oi i nation that ha* preserved
SAlftmL JORVSOS
their words and phrases from mutability, shall Ima^e thai
his dictionary can embalm iiis language, and secure it froitt
corruption and decay, that it is in bis power to change
sublunary nature, and clear the world at once from folly,
vanity, and affectation.
With this hope, however, academies have been instituted,
to guard the avenues of their languages, to retain fugitives^
and repulse intruders; but their vigilance and activity have
hitherto been vain; sounds arc too volatile and subtile
legal restraints; to enchain syllables, and to lash the w
are equally the undertakings of pride, unwilling to measure
its desires by its strength. The French language has visibly
changed under the inspection of the Academy; the style of
Amelot's translation of Father Paul is observed by Le
Courayer to be mi peu pass}; and no Italian will maintain
that the diction of any modem writer is not perceptibly
different from that of Boccace, Machiavel, or Caro.
Total and sudden transformations of a language seldom
happen; conquests and migrations are now very rare: but
there are other causes of change, which, though slow in the"
operation, and invisible in their progress, are perhaps i
much superior to human resistance, as the revolutions of
the sky, or intumescence of the tide. Commerce, howeve(
necessary, however lucrative, as it depraves the manners;
corrupts the language; they that have frequent intercours*
with strangers, to whom they endeavor to accommodate
themselves, must in time learn a mingled dialect, like the
jargon which serves the traffickers on the Mediterranean and
Indian coasts, This will not always be confined to the ex-
change, the warehouse, or the port, but will be communicated
by degrees to other ranks of the people, and be at last itt>
corporated with the current speech.
There are likewise internal causes equally forcible. The.
language most likely to continue long without alterations,
would be that of a nation raised a little, and but a littl^
above barbarity, secluded from strangers, and totally enn
ployed in procuring the conveniences of life; either without
books, or, like some of the Mahometan countries, with e
few: men thus busied and unlearned, having only such word*
as common use requires, would perhaps long continue t
TO THE DICTIONARY 213
^express the same notions by the same signs, But no such
<mnstancy can be expccled in a people polished by arts, and
<Jassed by subordination, where one part of the community
3s sustained and accommodated by the labor of the other.
"Those who have much leisure to think, will always be en-
larging the slock of ideas; and every increase of knowledge,
-whether real or fancied, will produce new words, or com-
limatiDn of words. When the mind is unchained from neces-
sity, it will range after convenience; when it is left at large
ID the fields of speculation, it will shift opinions; as any
custom is disused, the words that expressed it must perish
with it; as any opinion grows popular, it will innovate
speech in the same proportion as it alters practice.
As by the cultivation of various sciences a language is
amplified, it will he more furnished with words deflected
from their original sense; the geometrician will talk of a
courtier's zenith or the eccentric virtue of a wild hero, and
the physician, of sanguine expectations and phlegmatic de-
lays. Copiousness of speech will give opportunities to ca-
pricious choice, by which some words will be preferred, and
others degraded; vicissitudes of fashion will enforce the
use of new, or extend the signification of known terms.
The tropes of poetry will make hourly encroachments, and
flie metaphorical will become the current sense: pronuncia-
tion will be varied by levity or ignorance, and the pen must
at length comply with the tongue; illiterate writers will, at
one time or other, by public infatuation, rise into renown,
who, not knowing the original import of words, will use
them with colloquial licentiousness, confound distinction, and
forget propriety. As politeness increases, some expressions
will be considered as too gross and vulgar for the delicate.
Others as too formal and ceremonious for the gay and airy ;
new phrases are therefore adopted, which must for the same
reasons be in time dismissed. Swift, in his petty treatise on
the English language, allows that new words must some-
times be introduced, but proposes that none should be suf-
fered to become obsolete. But what makes a word obsolete,
more than general agreement to forbear it? and how shall
it be continued, when it conveys an offensive idea, or re-
called again into the mouths of mankind, when it has once
'm
flAHUEL J0HN90W
^
become unfamiliar by disuse, and unpleasing by unfa*
miliarity ?
There is another cause of alteration more prevalent than
any other, which yet in the present state of the world can-
not be obviated. A mixture of two languages will produce
a third distinct from both, and they will always be
where the chief parts of education, and the most conspicuous
accomplishment, is skill in ancient or in foreign tongues.
He that has long cultivated another language, will find its
words and combinations crowd upon his memory; and haste
and negligence, refinement and affectation, will obtrude bor-
rowed terms and exotic expressions.
The great pest of speech is frequency of translation. Nq,
book was ever turned from one language into another, with'
out imparling something of its native idiom; this is the mOh{
mischievous and comprehensive innovation; single won
may enter by thousands, and the fabric of ^e tongue conr
tinue the same; but new phraseology changes much
it ahers not the single stones of the building, but the ordaf
of the columns. If an academy should he established for
the cultivation of our style — which I, who can never wis"
to sec dependence muUiplled, hope the spirit of English lil
erty will hinder or destroy — let them, instead of compilin
grammars and dictionaries, endeavor, with all their uitlui
ence, to slop the license of translators, whose idleness
ignorance, if it be suffered to proceed, will reduce u; I
babble a dialect of France.
If the changes that we fear be thus irresistible, what n
mains but to acquiesce with silence, as in the other ineui
mountable distresses of humanity? It remains that Ti
retard what we cannot repel, that we palliate what we can"
not cure. Life may be lengthened by care, though death
cannot be ultimately defeated: tongues, like governments,
have a natural tendency to degeneration; we have long pre-
served our constitution, let us make some struggles for our
language.
In hope of giving longevity to that which its own natun
forbids to be immortal, 1 have devoted this book, the laboi
of years, to the honor of my country, that we may no long<
yield the palm of philolog> without & coatest, to the ni
TO THE DICTIONARY
215
_ E the continent. The chief glory of every people arises
from its authors : whether I shall add any thing by my own
writings to the reputation of English literature, must be left
to time: much of my life has been lost under the pressures
of disease; much has been trifled away; and much has al-
ways been spent in provision for the day that was passing
over me; but I shall not think my employment useless or
ignoble, if by my assistance foreign nations, and distant ages,
gain access to the propagators of knowledge, and understand
the teachers of truth; if my labors afford light to the re-
positories of science, and add celebrity to Bacon, to Hooker,
to Milton, and to Boyle.
When I am animated by this wish, I look with pleasure on
my book, however defective, and deliver it to the world with
the spirit of a man that has endeavored well. That it will
immediately become popular I have not promised to myself:
a few wild blunders, and risible absurdities, from which no
work of such multiplicity was ever free, may for a time
furnish folly with laughter, and harden ignorance into con-
tempt; but useful diligence will at last prevail, and there
never can be wanting some who distinguish desert; who will
consider that no dictionary of a living tongue ever can be
perfect, since, while it is hastening to publication, some
words are budding, and some falling away; that a whole life
cannot be spent upon syntax and etymology, and that even a
"Whole life would not he sufficient; that he, whose design
includes whatever language can express, must often speak
of what he does not understand ; that a writer will some-
times be hurried by eagerness to the end, and sometimes
■faint with weariness under a task which Scaliger compares
to the labors of the anvil and the mine; that what is obvious
is not always known, and what is known is not always
present; that sudden fits of inadvertency will surprise
vigilance, slight avocations wiH seduce attention, and casual
eclipses of tfie mind will darken teaming; arid that the
writer shall often in vain trace his memory at the moment
of need, for that which yesterday he knew with intuitive
readiness, and which will come uncalled into his thoughts
to-morrow.
bis work, when it shall be found that much is omitte^
I
I
216 SAMUEL JOHNSON
let it not be forgotten that much likewise h pcffomiedi
and though no book was ever spared out of tenderness to
the author, and the world is little solicitous to know whence
proceed the faults of that which it condemns; yet it may
gratify curiosity to inform it, that the English Dictionarj
was written with little assistance of the learned, and without
any patronage of the great; not in the soft obscurities of
retirement, or under the shelter of academic bowers, but
amidst inconvenience and distraction, in sickness and in sor-
row. It may repress the triumph of malignant criticism t»
observe, that if our language is not here fully displayed, I
have only failed in an attempt which no human powers have
hitherto completed. If the lexicons of ancient tongues,
immutably fixed, and comprised in a few volumes, be yeti
after the toil of successive ages, inadequate and delusive ; if
the aggregated knowledge, and co-operating diligence of the
Italian academicians, did not secure them from the censure
of Eeni ; if the embodied critics of France, when fifty years
had been spent upon their work, were obliged to change its
economy, and give their second edition another form, I may-
surely be contented without the praise of perfection, which,
if I could obtain, in this gloom of solitude, what would it
avail me? 1 have protracted my work till most of those
whom I wished to please have sunk into the grave, and
success and miscarriage are empty sounds : I therefore dis-
miss it with frigid tranquillity, having little to fear or hope
from censure or from nraise.
TO THE RIGHT HONORABLE THE EARL
OF CHESTERFIELD
February 7, 1735,
My Lokd:
I HAVE lately been informed by tiie proprietor of Tht
World, that two papers, in which my Dictionary is recom-
mended to the public, were written by your Lordships
To be so distinguished is an honor which, being very
little accustomed to favours from the great, I know act
well how to receive, or in what terms to acknowledge.
LETTER TO CHESTEBFIELD
slight <
Z17
sited
, upon some slight encouragement, I first i
your Lordship, I was overpowered, like the rest of mankind,
by the enchantment of your address ; and I could not forbear
to wish that I might boast myself 'Le vainqueur du vainqueur
de la terre ' ; that I might obtain that regard for which I saw
the world contending; but I found my attendance so Hltle en-
couraged, that neither pride nor modesty would suffer me to
continue it. When I had once addressed your Lordship in
public, I had exhausted all the art of pleasing which a re-
tired and uncourtly scholar can possess. I had done all that
I could; and no man is well pleased to have his all neglected,
be it ever so little.
Seven years, my Lord, have now passed, since I waited
in your outward rooms, or was repulsed from your door;
during which time I have been pushing on my work through
difficulties, of which it is useless to complain, and have
brought it at last to the verge of publication, without one
act of assistance, one word of encouragement, or one smile
of favor. Such treatment I did not expect, for I never had
3 Patron before.
The shepherd in Virgil grew at last acquainted with
Love, and found him a native of the rocks.
Is not a Patron, my Lord, one who looks with unconcern
on a man struggling for life in the water, and, when he has
reached ground, encumbers him with help? The notice
which you have heen pleased to take of my labors, had it
been early, had been kind ; but it has been delayed till I am
indifferent, and cannot enjoy it; till I am solitary, and can-
not impart it; till I am known, and do not want it. I hope
it is no very cynical asperity not to confess obligations where
no benefit has been received, or to be unwilling that the
Public should consider me as owing that to a Patron, which
Providence has enabled me to do for myself.
Having carried on my work thus far with so little obliga-
tion to any favorer of learning, I shall not be disappointed
though I should conclude if, if less be possible, with less;
for I have been long wakened from that dream of hope, in
which I once boasted myself with 3o much exultation.
My Lord, Your Lordship's most humble,
Most obedient servant, Sam. Johnson,
^
PREFACE TO SHAKESPEARE
BY SAMUEL JOHNSON. (1765)
THAT praises are without reason lanshed on the dead,
and that the honours due only to excellence are
paid to antiquity, is a complaint likely to be always
continued by those, who, being able to add nothing to truth,
hope for eminence from tlie heresies of paradox; or those,
who, being forced by disappointment upon consolatory ex-
pedients, are willing to hope from posterity what the present
age refuses, and flatter themselves that the regard which
is yet denied by envy, will be at last bestowed by time.
Antiquity, like every other quality that attracts the ootics
of mankind, has undoubtedly votaries that reverence iU
not from reason, but from prejudice. Some seem to admir*
indiscriminately whatever has been long preserved, with-
out considering that time has sometimes co-operated will*
chance; all perhaps are more willing to honour past ths
present excellence; and thx mind contemplates genii
through the shades of age, as the eye surveys the si
through artificial opacity. The great contention of criti-
cism is to find the faults of the moderns, and the beauties oj
the ancients. While an author is yet living we estimate hii
powers by his worst performance, and when he is dead, ws.
rate them by his best.
To works, however, of which the excellence is not abso-
lute and definite, but gradual and comparative; to works
not raised upon principles demonstrative and scientiGck, hot
appealing wholly to observation and experience, no other^
test can be applied than length of duration and continuani
of esteem. What mankind have long possessed they bai
often examined and compared; and if they persist to
the possession, it is because frequent comparisons have coi
firmed opinion in its favour. As among the works of natui
no man can properly call a river deep, or a mountain hi^
218
TO SHAKESPBARK 219
9lathout the knowledge of many mountains, and many rivers ;
so in the productions of genius, nothing can be stiled ex-
cellent till it has been compared with other works of the
same kind. Demonstration immediately displays ils power,
and has nothing to hope or fear from the flux of years;
but works tentative and experimental must be estimated by
their proportion to the general and collective ability of
man, as it is discovered in a long succession of endeavours.
Of the first building that was raised, it might be with cer-
tainty determined that it was round or square; but whether
it was spacious or lofty must have been referred to time.
The Pythagorean scale of numbers was at once discovered
to be perfect; but the poems of Homer we yet know not to
transcend the common limits of human intelligence, but
by remarking, that nation after nation, and century after
century, has been able to do little more than transpose his
incidents, new-name his characters, and paraphrase his senti-
ments.
The reverence due to writings that have long subsisted
arises therefore not from any credulous confidence in the
superior wisdom of past ages, or gloomy persuasion of the
degeneracy of mankind, but is the consequence of acknowl-
edged and indubitable positions, that what has been longest
known has been most considered, and what is most con-
sidered is best understood.
The Poet, of whose works I have undertaken the re-
vision, may now begin to assume the dignity of an ancient,
and claim the privilege of established fame and prescriptive
veneration. He has long outlived his century, the term com-
monly fixed as the test of literary merit. Whatever ad-
vantages he might once derive from personal allusions, local
customs, or temporary opinions, have for many years been
lost; and every topick of merriment, or motive of sorrow,
which the modes of artificial life afforded him, now only
sbscure the scenes which they once illuminated. The ef-
fects of favour and competition are at an end ; the tradition
of his friendships and his enemies has perished; his works
support no opinion with arguments, nor supply any faction
with invectives; they can neither indulge vanity nor gratify
kalignity; but are read without any other reason than the
SAMUEL JOHNSON
desire of pleasure, and arc therefore praised only as pleasare
is obtained: yet, thus unassisted by interest or passion, they
have past through variations of taste and changes of man-
ners, and, as they devolved from one generation to another,
have received new honours at every transmission.
But because human judgment, though it be gradually gain-
ing upon certainty, never becomes infallible; and approba-
tion, though long continued, may yet be only the approbation
of prejudice or fashion; it is proper to inquire, by what
peculiarities of excellence Shakespeare has gained and kept
the favour of his countrymen.
Nothing can please many, and please long, but just repre-
sentations of general nature. Particular manner, can be
known to few, and therefore few only can judge how nearly
they are copied. The irregular combinations of fanciful in-
vention may delight a-while, by that novelty of which the
common satiety of life sends us all in quest ; but the pleasures
of sudden wonder are soon exhausted, and the mind can
only repose on the stability of truth.
Shakespeare is above all writers, at least above all modern
writers, the poet of nature; the poet that holds up to his
readers a faithful mirrour of manners and of life. His
characters are not modified by the customs of particular
places, unpractised by the rest of the world; by the peculi-
arities of studies or professions, which can operate but upon
small numbers; or by the accidents of transient fashions or
temporary opinions: they are the genuine progeny of com-
mon humanity, such as the world will always supply, and
observation will always find. His persons act and speak
by the influence of those general passions and principles
by which all minds are agitated, and the whole system of
life is continued in motion. In the writings of other poets
a character is too often an individual; in those of Shake-
speare it is commonly a species.
It is from this wide extension of design that so much in-
struction is derived. It is this which fills the plays of
Shakespeare with practical axioms and domestic wisdom.
It was said of Euripides, that every verse was a precept;
and it may be said of Shakespeare, that from his works
may be collected a system of civil and oeconomical prudencb
TO SHAKESPEAKE 221
f et his real power is not shewn in the splendour of particular
jiassages, but by the progress of his fable, and the tenour
of his dialogue; and he that tries to recommend him by
select quotations, will succeed like the pedant in Hierocles,
Avho, when he offered his house to sale, carried a brick in
tiis pocket as a specimen.
It will not easily be imagined how much Shakespeare ex-
cells in accommodating his sentiments to real life, but by
comparing him with other authors. It was observed of
the ancient schools of decSamation, that the more umgently
they were frequented, the more was the student disquali-
fied for the world, because he found nothing there which
he should ever meet in any other place. The same re-
mark may be applied to every stage but that of Shakespeare.
The theatre, when it is under any other direction, is
peopled by such characters as were never seen, convers-
ing in a language which was never heard, upon topicks
which will never rise in the commerce of mankind. But
the dialogue of this author is often so evidently deter-
mined by the incident which produces it, and is pursued
with so much eaae and simplicity, that it seems scarcely to
claim the merit of fiction, hut to have been gleaned by
diligent selection out of common conversation, and com-
mon occurrences.
Upon every other stage the universal agent is love, by
whose power all good and evil is distributed, and every
action quickened or retarded. To bring a lover, a lady and
a rival into the fable; to entangle them in contradictory
obligations, perplex them with oppositions of interest, and
harrass them with violence of desires inconsistent with each
other; to make them meet in rapture and part in agony; to
fill their mouths with hyperbolical joy and outrageous sor-
row; to distress them as nothing human ever was distressed;
to deliver them as nothing human ever was delivered; is the
business of a modem dramatist. For this probability is
violated, life is misrepresented, and language is depraved.
But love is only one of many passions; and as it has no
great influence upon the sum of life, it has little operation
in the dramas of a poet, who caught his ideas from the
living world, 4nd exhibited only what he saw before him.
SAMUEL JOHIVSON
He knew, that any other passion, as it was re^lar or ex-
orbitant, was a cause of happiness or calamity.
Characters thus ample and general were not easily dis-
criminated and preserved, yet perhaps no poet ever kept hl9
personages more distinct from each other. I will not say
with Pope, that every speech may be assigned to the propef
speaker, because many speeches there are which have noth-
ing characteristical ; but perhaps, though some may be
equally adapted to every person, it will be difEcult to find
any that can be properly transferred from the present pos-
sessor to another claimant. The choice is right, when there
is reason for choice.
Other dramatists can only gain attention by hyperbolical
or aggravated characters, by fabulous and unexampled ex*
cellence or depravity, as the writers of barbarous romances
invigorated the reader by a giant and a dwarf; and he that
should form his expectations of human affairs from the play,
or from the tale, would be equally deceived. Shakespeart
has no heroes; his scenes are occupied only by men, who'
act and speak as the reader thinks that be should himself
have spoken or acted on the same occasion: Even where the
agency is supernatural the dialogue is level with life. Othet
writers disguise the most natural passions and most frequenl
incidents ; so that he who contemplates them in the book win
not know them in the world; Shakespeare approximates the
remote, and familiarizes the wonderful; the event which t
represents will not happen, but if It were possible, its effect)
would probably be such as he has assigned; and it may 1
said, that he has not only shewn human nature as it acts i
real exigencies, but as it would be found in trials, to whld
it cannot be exposed.
This therefore is the praise of Shakespeare, that hii drami
is the mirrour of life; that he who has mazed his imaging
tion, in following the phantoms which other writers raiM
up before him, may here be cured of his delirious extasiei^
by reading human sentiments in human language, by S
from which a hermit may estimate the transactions of th(
world, and a confessor predict the progress of the passions
His adherence to general nature has exposed him to t'
censure of criticks, who form their Judgments upon narr
TO shakbSpearb
principles. Dennis and Rhymer think his Romans not suf-
ficiently Roman; and Voltaire censures his kings as not com-
pletely royal. Dennis is offended, that Menenius, a senator
of Rome, should play the buffoon; and Voltaire perhaps
thinks decency violated when the Danish Usurper is repre-
sented as a drunkard. But Shakespeare always makes nature
predominate over accident; and if he preserves the essential
character, is not very careful of distinctions superinduced
and adventitious. His story requires Romans or kings, but
he thinks only on men. He knew that Rome, like every
other city, had men of all dispositions ; and wanting a
buffoon, he went into the senate-house for that which the
senate-house would certainly have afforded him. He was in-
clined to shew an usurper and a murderer not only odious
but despicable, he therefore added drunkenness to his other
qualities, knowing that kings love wine like other men, and
that wine exerts its natural power upon kings. These are
the petty cavils of petty minds ; a poet overlooks the casual
distinction of country and condition, as a painter, satisfied
with the figure, neglects the drapery.
The censure which he has incurred by mixing comick and
tragick scenes, as it extends to all his works, deserves more
consideration. Let the fact be first stated, and then
examined.
Shakespeare's plays are not in the rigorous and critical
sense eillier tragedies or comedies, but compositions of a
distinct kind; exhibiting the real state of sublunary nature,
which partakes of good and evil, joy and sorrow, mingled
with endless variety of proportion and innumerable modes
of combination; and e.'tpressing the course of the world, in
which the loss of one is the gain of another; in which, at
the same time, the reveller is hasting to his wine, and the
mourner burying his friend; in which the malignity of one
is sometimes defeated by the frolick of another; and many
tnischiefs and many benefits are done and hindered without
design.
Out of this chaos of mingled purposes and casualties the
ancient poets, according to the laws which custom had pre-
scribed, selected some the crimes of men, and some their ab-
surdities; some the momentous vicissitudes of life, and some
SAMUEL JOHNSON
the lighter occurrences; some the terrours of distress, and
some the gayeties of prosperity. Thus rose the two modes
of iinitation, known by the names of tragedy and comedy,
compositions intended to promote different ends by contrary
means, and considered as so little allied, that I do not rec-
ollect among the Greeks or Romans a single writer who at-
tempted both.
Shakespeare has united the powers of exciting laughter
and sorrow not only in one mind, but in one composition.
Almost all his plays are divided between serious and ludi-
crous characters, and. in the successive evolutions of the de-
sign, sometimes produce seriousness and sorrow, and some-
times levity and laughter.
That this is a practice contrary to the rules of criticism
will be readily allowed; but there is always an appeal open
from criticism to nature. The end of writing is to instruct;
the end of poetry is to instruct by pleasing. That the min-
gled drama may convey all the instruction of tragedy or
comedy cannot be denied, because it includes both in its
alterations of exhibition and approaches nearer than either
to the appearance of life, by siiewing how great machina-
tions and slender designs may promote or obviate one an-
other, and the high and the low co-operate in the general
system by unavoidable concatenation.
It is objected, that by this change of scenes the passions
are interrupted in their progression, and that the principal
event, being not advanced by a due gradation of preparatory
incidents, wants at last the power to move, which constitutes
the perfection of dramatick poetry. This reasoning is so
specious, that it is received as true even by those who in
daily experience feel it to be false. The interchanges of min-
gled scenes seldom fail to produce die intended vicissitudes
of passion. Fiction cannot move so much, but that the at-
tention may be easily transferred ; and though it must be
allowed that pleasing melancholy be sometimes interrupted
by unwelcome levity, yet let it be considered likewise, that
melancholy is often not pleasing, and that the disturbance
of one man may be the relief of another; that different
auditors have different habitudes: and that, upon the whole,
all pleasure consists in variety.
TO SHAKESPEARE 225
^e players, who in their edition divided our authour's
^Orks into comedies, histories, and tragedies, seem not to
have distinguished the three kinds by any very exact or
definite Ideas.
And action which ended happily to the principal persons,
however serious or distressful through its intermediate in-
cidents, in their opinion, constituted a comedy. This idea
of a comedy continued long amongst us ; and plays were
written, which, by changing the catastrophe, were tragedies
to-day, and comedies to-morrow.
Tragedy was not in those times a poem of more general dig-
nity or elevation than comedy; it required only a calamitous
conclusion, with which the common criticism of that age was
satisfied, whatever lighter pleasure it afforded in its progress.
History was a series of actions, with no other than chrono-
logical succession, independent on each other, and without
any tendency to introduce or regulate the conclusion. It is
not always very nicely distinguished from tragedy. There
is not much nearer approach to unity of action in the tragedy
of Aniony and Cleopatra, than in the history of Richard the
Second. But a history might be continued tlirough many
plays; as it had no plan, it had no limits.
Through all these denominations of the drama. Shake-
speare's mode of composition is the same; an interchange
of seriousness and merriment, by which the mind is softened
at one time, and exhilarated at another. But whatever be
his purpose, whether to gladden or depress, or to conduct the
story, without vehemence or emotion, through tracts of
easy and familiar dialogue, he never fails to attain his
purpose; as he commands us, we laugh or mourn, or sit
silent with quiet expectation, in tranquillity without in-
difference.
When Shakespeare's plan is understood, most of the
criticisms of Rhymer and Voltaire vanish away. The play
of Hamlet is opened, without impropriety, by two sentinels;
lago bellows at Brabantio's window, without injury to the
scheme of the play, though in terms which a modem audi-
ence would not easily endure; the character of Polonius
is seasonable and useful; and the Grave-diggers themselves
may be heard with applause.
(8)
tm SAHtTEL JOHNSON
Shakesptare engaged in dramatick poetry with the worM
open before him ; the rules of the ancients were yet knowa
to few; but publick judgment was unformed; he had i
example of such fame as might force him upon imiUtioit,
nor critjcks of such authority as might restrain his ex-
travagance: He therefore indulged his natural disposition*,
and his disposition, as Rhymer has remarked, led hin
comedy. In tragedy he often writes, with great appearance
of toil and study, what is written at last with little felicity J
but in his comick scenes, he seems to produce without labouff
what no labour can improve. In tragedy he is always strug-
gling after some occasion to be comick ; but in comedy ha
seems to repose, or to luxuriate, as in a mode of thinking coti'
genial to his nature. In his tragick scenes there is alwBya
something wanting, but his comedy often surpasses ex-
pectation or desire. His comedy pleases by the thoughts and'
the language, and his tragedy for the greater part by i
cident and action. His tragedy seems to be skiU, his comedy
to be instinct.
The force of his comick scenes has suffered little diminix
tion from the changes made by a century and a half, ift
manners or in words. As his personages act upon prill'
ciples arising from genuine passion, very little modifiea
by particular forms, their pleasures and vexations an
communicable to all times and to all places ; they are natural,
and therefore durable; the adventitious peculiarities of
personal habits, are only superficial dies, bright and pleas*
ing for a little while, yet soon fading to a dim tinct, with*
out any remains of former lustre; but the discriminationa
of true passion are the colours of nature ; they pervat
the whole mass, and can only perish with the body thi
exhibits them. The accidental compositions of heterogene<
ous modes are dissolved by the chance which combined'
them; but the uniform simplicity of primitive qualitiel
neither admits increase, nor suffers decay. The sand hclig
by one flood is scattered by another, hut the rock alwayl
continues in its place. The stream of time, which is c
tinually washing the dissoluble fabrlcks of other poetl^
passes without injury by the adamant of Shakespeare
It there be, what I believe there is, in every nation, I
Btile which never becomes obsolete, a certain mode of
phraseology ao consonant and congenial to the analogy
and principles of its respective language as to remain set-
tled and unaltered ; this style is probably to be sought in
the common intercourse of life, among those who speak
only to be understood, without ambition of elegance. The
polite are always catching modish innovations, and the
learned depart from established forms of speech, in hope
of finding or making better; those who wish for distinction
forsake the vulgar, when the vulgar is right; but there is
a conversation above grossness and below re6iiement,
where propriety resides, and where tliis poet seems to have
gathered his comick dialogue. He is therefore more agree-
able to the ears of the present age than any other authour
equally remote, and among his other excellencies deserves
to be studied as one of the original masters of our language.
These observations are to be considered not as unex-
ceptional ly constant, but as containing general and pre-
dominant truth. Shakespeare's familiar dialogue is affirmed
to be smooth and clear, yet not wholly without ruggedness
or difficulty ; as a country may be eminently fruitful, though
it has spots unfit for cultivation : His characters are praised as
natural, though their sentiments are sometimes forced, and
their actions improbable; as the earth upon the whole is
spherical, though its surface is varied with protuberances
and cavities.
Shakespeare with his excellencies has likewise faults, and
faults sufficient to obscure and overwhelm any other merit.
I shall shew them in the proportion in which they appear to
me, without envious malignity or superstitious veneration.
No question can be more innocently discussed than a dead
poet's pretensions to renown ; and little regard is due to that
bigotry which sets candour higher than truth.
His first defect is that to which may be imputed most of
the evil in books or in men. He sacrifices virtue to con-
venience, and is so much more careful to please than to
instruct, that he seems to write without any moral purpose.
From his writings indeed a system of social duty may be
selected, for he that thinks reasonably must think morally;
but his precepts and axioms drop casually from him; he
K28 5AHUEI. JOHNSON
makes no just distribution of good or evil, nor is always care-
ful to shew in the virtuous a disapprobation of the wicked; he
carries his persons indifferently through right and wrong,
and at the close dismisses them without further care,
and leaves their examples to operate by chance. This fault
the barbarity of his age cannot extenuate; for it is always
a writer's duty to make the world better, and justice is a
virtue independent on time or place.
" The plots are often so loosely formed, that a very slight
consideration may improve them, and so carelessly pur-
sued, that he seems not always fully to comprehend his own
design. He omits opportunities of instructing or delighting
J which the train of his story seems to force upon him, and
apparently rejects those exhibitions which would be more
affecting, for the sake of those which are more easy.
It may be observed, that in many of his plays the latter
part is evidently neglected. When he found himself near
the end of his work, and, in view of his reward, he shortened
the labour to snatch the profit. He therefore remits his
efforts where he should most vigorously exert them, and his
catastrophe is improbably produced or imperfectly repre-
He had no regard to distinction of time or place, but
gives to one age or nation, without scruple, the customs, in-
stitutions, and opinions of another, at the expence not only
of likelihood, but of possibility. These faults Pope has en-
deavoured, with more zeal than judgment, to transfer to his
imagined interpolators. We need not wonder to find
Hector quoting Aristotle, when we see the loves of Theseus
and Hippolyta combined with the Gothkk mythology of
fairies. Shakespeare, indeed, was not the only violator of
chronology, for in the same age Sidney, who wanted not
the advantages of learning, has, in his Arcadia, confounded
the pastoral with the feudal times, the days of innocence,
quiet and security, with those of turbulence, violence, and
adventure.
In his comick scenes he is seldom very successful, when
he engages his characters in reciprocations of smartness and
contests of sarcasm; their jests are commonly gross, and
their pleasantry licentious; neither his gentlemen nor his
TO SHAKESPEARE 229
ladies have much delicacy, nor are sufficiently distinguished
from his clowns by any apoearance of refined manners.
Whether he represented the real conversation of his time is
not easy to determine; the reign of Elizabeth is commonly
supposed to have been a time of stateliness, formality and
reserve; yet perhaps the relaxations of that severity were
not very elegant. There must, however, have been always
some modes of gayety preferable to others, and a writer
ought to chuse the best.
In tragedy his performance seems constantly to be worse,
as his labour is more. The effusions of passion which ex-
igence forces out are for the most part striking and ener-
getick ; but whenever he solicits his invention, or strains his
faculties, the offspring of his throes is tumour, meanness,
tediousness, and obscurity.
In narration he affects a disproportionate pomp of diction,
and a wearisome train of circumlocution, and tells the inci-
dent imperfectly in many words, which might have been
more plainly delivered in few. Narration in dramatick
poetry is naturally tedious, as it is unanimated and inactive,
and obstructs the progress of the action; it should there-
fore always be rapid, and enlivened by frequent interruption.
Shakespeare found it an encumberance, and instead of
lightening it by brevity, endeavoured to recommend it by
dignity and splendour.
His declamations or set speeches are commonly cold and
weak, for his power was the power of nature; when he en-
deavoured, like other tragick writers, to catch opportunities
of amplification, and instead of inquiring what the occasion
demanded, to show how much his stores of knowledge could
supply, he seldom escapes without the pity or resentment of
his reader.
It is incident to him to be now and then entangled with
an unwieldy sentiment, which he cannot well express, and
will not reject; he struggles with it a while, and if it con-
tinues stubborn, comprises it in words such as occur, and
leaves it to be disentangled and evolved by those who have
more leisure to bestow upon it.
Not that always where the language is intricate the
s subtle, or the image always great where the line is
SAMUEL JOHNSON
buUcy; the equality of words to things is very often neg-
lected, and trivia] sentiments and vulgar ideas disappoint
the attention, to which they are tecommended by sonoroui
epithets and swelling figures.
But the admirers of this great poet have never less
reason to indulge their hopes of supreme, excellence, than
when he seems fully resolved to sink them in dejection,
and mollify them with tender emotions by the fall of great^
ness, the danger of innocence, or the crosses of love,
is not long soft and pathetick without some idle conceil
' contemptible equivocation. He no sooner begins to move,
than he counteracts himself; and terrour and pity, as tlaey
arc rising in the mind, are checked and blasted by sudden
frigidity,
A quibble is to Shakespeare, what luminous vapours 9
to the traveller; he follows it at all adventures; it is sure
to lead him out of his way, and sure to engulf him in the
mire. It has some malignant power over his mind, and its
fascinations are irresistible. Whatever be the dignity or
profundity of his disquisition, whether he be enlarging
knowledge or exalting affection, whether he be amusing
attention with incidents, or enchaining it in suspense, let
but a quibble spring up before him, and he leaves his Work
unfinished. A quibble is the golden apple for which he will
always turn aside from Ills career, or stoop from his eleva-
tion. A quibble, poor and barren as it is, gave him silch
delight, that he was content to purchase it, by the sacrifice
of reason, propriety and truth. A quibble was to him
fatal Cleopatra for which he lost the world, and was con-
tent to lose it.
It will be thought strange, that, in enumerating the de-
fects of this writer, I have not yet mentioned his neglect
of the unities; his violation of those laws which have been
instituted and established by the joint authority of poets
and cri ticks.
For his other deviations from the art of writing I resign
him to critical justice, without making any other demand in
his favour, than that which must be indulged to all human
excellence: that his virtues be rated with his failings: But
from the censure which this irregularity may bring upoA^
r*^ t. -
TO SHAKESPEARE
him, I shall, with due reverence to that learning which I
must oppose, adven jre to try how I can defend him.
His histories, being neitlier tragedies nor comedies are
not subject to any of their laws; nothing more is necessary
to all the praise which they expect, than that the changes
of action he so prepared as to be understood, that the inci-
dents be various and affecting, and the characters consistent,
natural, and distinct. No other unity is intended, and there-
fore none is to be sought.
In his other works he has well enough preserved the
unity of action. He has not, indeed, an intrigue reguiarly
perplexed and regularly unravelled : he does not endeavour
to hide his design only to discover it, for this is seldom the
order of real events, and Shakespeare is the poet of nature:
But his plan has commonly what Aristotle requires, a begin-
ning, a middle, and an end; one event is concatenated with
another, and the conclusion follows by easy consequence.
There are perhaps some incidents that might be spared, as in
other poets there is much talk that only fills up time upon
the stage; but the general system makes gradual advances,
and the end of the play is the end of expectation.
To the unities of time and place he has shewn no regard;
and perhaps a nearer view of the principles on which they
stand will diminish their value, and withdraw from them the
veneration which, from the time of Comeille, they have veiy
generally received, by discovering that they have given more
trouble to the poet, than pleasure to the auditor.
The necessity of observing the unities of time and place
arises from the supposed necessity of making the drama
credible. The criticks hold it impossible, that an action of
months or years can be possibly believed to pass in three
hours; or that the spectator can suppose himself to sit in the
theatre, while ambassadors go and return between distant
kings while armies are levied and towns besieged, while
an exile wanders and returns, or til! he whom they saw
courting his mistress, shall lament the untimely fall of his
son. The mind revolts from evident falsehood, and fiction
loses its force when it departs from the resemblance of
reality
~ 1 the narrow limitation of time necessarily arises tb*
i
m SAMUEL JOHNSON
contraction of place. The spectator, who knows that he
saw the first act at Alexandria, cannot suppose that he sees
the next at Rome, at a distance to which not the dragons of
Medea could, in so short a time, have transported him ; he-
Icnows wilh certainty that he has not changed his place,
and he knows that place cannot change itself; that what
was a house cannot become a plain; that what was Thebes
can never be PersepoHs.
Such is the triumphant langtiage with which a critick
exuhs over the misery of an irregular poet, and exults com-
monly without resistance or reply. It is time therefore to
tell him by the authority of Shakespeare, that he assumes,
as an unquestionable principle, a position, which, while his
breath is forming it into words, bis understanding pro-
nounces to be false. It is false, that any representation is
mistake for reality; that any dramatick fable in its ma-
teriality was ever credible, or, for a single moment, was ever
credited.
The objection arising from the impossibility of passing
the first hour at Alexandria, and the next at Rome, supposes,
that when the play opens, the spectator really imagines him-
self at Alexandria, and believes that his walk to the theatre
has been a voyage to Egypt, and that he lives in the days of
Antony and Cleopatra. Surely he that imagines this may
imagine more. He that can take the stage at one time for
the palace of the Ptolemies, may take it in half an hour for
the promontory of Aclium. Delusion, if delusion be ad-
mitted, has no certain limitation; if the spectator can be
once persuaded, that his old acquaintance are Alexander and
Casar, that a room illuminated with candles is the plain of
Pharsalia, or the bank of Granicus, he is in a state of ele-
vation above the reach of reason, or of truth, and from die
heights of empyrean poetry, may despise the circumscrip-
tions of terrestrial nature. There is no reason why a mind
thus wandering in extacy should count the clock, or why an
hour should not be a century in that calenture of the brains
that can make the stage a iield.
The truth is, that the spectators are always in their senses,
and know, from the first act to the last, that the stage is only
a stage, and that the players are only players. They came
TO SHAKESPEARE 233
to hear a certain number of lines recited with just geature
and elegant modulation. The lines relate to some action,
and an action must be in some place ; but the different ac-
tions that complete a story may be in places very remote
from each other; and where is the absurdity of allowing that
space to represent first Athens, and then Sicily, which was
always known to be neither Sicily nor Athens, but a modern
theatre?
By supposition, as place is introduced, times may be ex-
tended; the time required by the fable elapses for the most
part between the acts; for, of so much of the action as is
represented, the real and poetical duration is the same. If,
in the first act, preparations for war against Miihrjdates are
represented to be made in Rome, the event of the war may,
without absurdity, be represented, in the catastrophe, as
happening in Pontus; we laiow that there is neither war,
nor preparation for war; we know that we are neither in
Rome nor Pontus; that neither Mithridates nor Lucullus arc
before us. The drama exhibits successive imitations of suc-
cessive actions ; and why may not the second imitation rep-
resent an action that happened years after the first, if it be
so connected with it, that nothing but time can be supposed
to intervene? Time is. of all modes of existence, most ob-
sequious to the imagination; a lapse of years is as easily
conceived as a passage of hours. In contemplation we easily
contract the time of real actions, and therefore willingly
permit it to be contracted when we only see their imitation.
It will be asked, how the drama moves, if it is not credited.
It is credited with all the credit due to a drama. It is
credited, whenever it moves, as a just picture of a real
original ; as representing to the auditor what he would him-
self feel, if he were to do or suffer what is there feigned to
be suffered or to be done. The reflection that strikes the
heart is not, that the evils before us are real evils, but
that they are evils to which we ourselves may be ex-
posed. If there be any fallacy, it is not that we fancy the
players, but that we fancy ourselves unhappy for a moment;
but we rather lament the possibility than suppose the pres-
ence of misery, as a mother weeps over her babe, when she
mbers that death may take it from her. The delight
jg^nbe:
Win SAMUEL JOHNSON
^ of tragedy proceeds from our consciousness of fiction ; if we
thought murders and treasons real, they would please no
more.
Imitations produce pain or pleasure, not because they are
mistaken for realities, but because they bring realities to
mind. When the imagination is recreated by a painted land-
scape, the trees are not supposed capable to give us shade,
or the fountains coolness; but we consider, how we should
be pleased with such fountains playing beside us, and such
woods waving over us. We are agitated in reading the his-
tory of Henry the Fifth, yet no man takes his book for the
field of Agencourt. A dramatick exhibition is a book recited
with concomitants that en crease or diminish its effect
Familiar comedy is often more powerful in the theatre, than
on the page; imperial tragedy is always less. The humour
of Petruchio may be heightened by grimace ; but what voice
or what gesture can hope to add dignity or force to the solU-
oquy of Cato.
A play read, affects the mind like a play acted. It is
therefore evident, that the action is not supposed to be real;
and it follows, that between the acts a longer or shorter
time may be allowed to pass, and that no more account of
space or duration is to be taken by the auditor of a drama,
than by the reader of a narrative, before whom may pass in
an hour the life of a hero, or the revolutions of an empire.
Whether Shakespeare knew the unities, and rejected
them by design, or deviated from them by happy ignorance,
it is, I think, impossible to decide, and useless to enquire.
We may reasonably suppose, that, when he rose to notice,
he did not want the counsels and admonitions of scholars
and criticks, and that he at last deliberately persisted in a
practice, which he might have begun by chance. As noth-
ing is essential to the fable, but unity of action, and as the
unities of time and place arise evidently from false assuntp*
tions, and, by circumscribing the extent of the drama, les-
sen its variety, I cannot think it much to be lamented, that
they were not known by him, or not observed: Nor, if
such another poet could arise, should I very vehemently
reproach him, that his first act passed at Venice, and his
next in Cyprus. Such violations of rules merely positnCi
TO SHAKESPEARE
become the comprehensive genius of Stuikespeare, and
such cenaures are suitable to the minute and slender criti-
cism of Voltaire:
Nan usque adeo pertoiscuit imis
Longus surama dies, ut non, si voce Metelli
Serventur teges, malint a Cassare tolli.
Yet when I speak thus slightly of dramatick rules, I can-
not but recollect how much wit and learning may be pro-
duced against me; before such authorities I am afraid te
stand, not that I think the present question one of those that
are to be decided by mere authority, but because it is to be
suspected, that these precepts have not been so easily re-
ceived but for better reasons than I have yet been able to
find. The result of my enquiries, in which it would be
ludicrous to boast of impartiality, is, that the unities of
time and place are not essentia! to a just drama, that
though they may sometimes conduce to pleasure, they are
always to be sacrificed to the nobler beauties of variety and
instruction; and that a play, written with nice observation
of critical rules, is to be contemplated as an elaborate curi-
osity, as the product of superfluous and ostentatious art, by
■which is shewn, rather what is possible, than what is neces-
sary.
He that, without diminution of any other excellence, shall
preserve all the unities unbroken, deserves the like applause
with the architect, who shall display all the orders of archi-
tecture in a citadel, without any deduction from its strength;
but the principal beauty of a citadel is to exclude the enemy;
and the greatest graces of a play, are to copy nature and
instruct life.
Perhaps what I have here not dogmatically but delibera-
tively written, may reeal the principles of the drama to a
new examination. I am almost frighted at my own temerity ;
and when I estimate the fame and the strength of those that
maintain the contrary opinion, am ready to sink down
in reverential silence ; as Mneas withdrew from the defence
of Troy, when he saw Neptune shaking the wall, and Juno
heading the besiegers.
Tiose whom mj arguments cannot persuade to give their
' tX SAXUEL JUHN9UN
xppnAa&M to the judgment of Shakespeare, will easily,
if they consider the conditicm of bis life, make some allow-
ance for his ignorance.
Every man's performances, to be rigbtly estimated, must
be compared with the state of the age in which he lived,
and with his own particular opportunities; and though to the
reader a book be not worse or better for the circumstances
of the authour, yet as there is always a silent reference of
human works to human abilities, and as the enquiry, how
far man may extend his designs, or how high he may rate
his native force, is of far greater dignity than in what rank
we shall place any particular performance, curiosity is al-
ways busy to discover the instruments, as well as to survey
the workmanship, to know how much is to be aicribed to
original powers, and how much to casual and adven-
-r-^^ titious help. The palaces of Peru or Mexico were certainly
'NjNJ I mean and incommodious habitations, if compared to the
/houses of European monarchs; yet who could forbear
to view them with astonishment, who remembered that they
were built without the use of iron?
The English nation, in the time of Shakespeare, was yet
struggling to emerge from barbarity. The philology of Italy
had been transplanted hither in the reign of Henry the
Eighth; and the learned languages had been successfully cul-
tivated by Lilly, Linacer, and More; by Pole, Cheke, and
Gardiner; and afterwards by Smith, Clerk, Haddon, and
Ascham. Greek was now taught to boys in the principal
schools; and those who united elegance with learning, read,
with great diligence, the Italian and Spanish poets. But
literature was yet confined to professed scholars, or to men
and women of high rank. The publick was gross and dark;
and to be able to read and write, was an accomplishment still
valued for its rarity.
Nations, like individuals, have their infancy. A people
newly awakened to literary curiosity, being yet unac-
quainted with the true state of things, knows not how to
judge of that which is proposed as its resemblance. What-
ever is remote from common appearances is always wel-
come to vulgar, as to childish credulity: and of a country
tin enlightened by learning, the whole people is the vulgar
TO SHAKESPEARE 237
The study of those who then aspired to plebeian learning
was laid out upon adventures, giants, dragons, and enchant-
ments. The Death of Arthur was the favourite volume.
The mind, which has feasted on the luxurious wonders of
fiction, has no taste of the insipidity of truth. A play which
imitated only the common occurrences of the world, would,
upon the admirers of Palmerin and Guy of Warwick, have
made little impression; he that wrote for such an audience
was under the necessity of looking round for strange events
and fabulous transactions, and that incredibility, by which
maturer Isnowledge is offended, was the chief recommenda-
tion of writings, to unskilful curiosity.
Our authour'a plots are generally borrowed from novels,
and it is reasonable to suppose, that he chose the most popu-
lar, such as were read by many, and related by more ; for his
audience could not have followed him through the intrica-
cies of the drama, had they not held the thread of the story
in their hands.
The stories, which we now find only in remoter authours,
were in his time accessible and familiar. The fable of As
you like it, which is supposed to be copied from Chaucer's
Gamelyn, was a little pamphlet of those times; and old Mr.
Cibber remembered the tale of Hamlet in plain English
prose, which the criticks have now to seek in Saxo Cram-
maticus.
His English histories he took from English chronicles
and English ballads; and as tlie ancient writers were made
known to his countrymen by versions, they supplied him with
new subjects; he dilated some of Plutarch's lives into plays,
when they had been translated by North.
His plots, whether historical or fabulous, are always
crouded with incidents, by which the attention of a rude
people was more easily caught than by sentiment or argu-
mentation; and such is the power of the marvellous even
over those who despise it, that every man finds his mind
more strongly seized by the tragedies of Shakespeare than of
any other writer; others please us by particular speeches,
but he always makes us anxious for the event, and has per-
haps excelled ail but Homer in securing the first purpose
of a writer, by exciting restless and unquenchable curiosity
m SAMUEL JOHNSON
and compelling him that reads his work to read it throngfi.
The shows and bustle with which his plays abound have
the same original. As knowledge advances, pleasure passes
from the eye to the ear, but returns, as it declines, from
the ear to the eye. Those to whom our authour'e labotirs
were exhibited had more skill in pomps or processions than
in poetical language, and perhaps wanted some visible and
discriminated events, as comments on the dialogue. He
knew how he should most please ; and whether his practice
is more agreeable to nature, or whether his example has
prejudiced the nation, we still find that on our stage some-
thing must be done as well as said, and inactive declama-
tion is very coldly heard, however musical or elegant, pas-
sionate or sublime.
Voltaire expresses his wonder, thai our authour's extrava-
gances are endured by a nation, which has seen the tragedy
of Cato. Let him be answered, that Addison speaks the lan-
guage of poets, and Shakespeare, of men. We find in Cato
innumerable beauties which enamour us of its authour, but
we see nothing that acquaints us with human sentiments or
human actions ; we place it with the fairest and the noblest
progeny which judgment propagates by conjunction with
learning, but Othello is the vigorous and vivacious offspring
of observation impregnated by genius. Cato affords a splea-<
did exhibition of artificial and fictitious manners, and de-
livers just and noble sentiments, in diction easy, elevated
and harmonious, but its hopes and fears communicate no
vibration to the heart; the composition refers us only to
the writer; we pronounce the name of Cato, but we think
on Addison.
The work of a correct and regular writer is a garden
accurately formed and diligently planted, varied with shades,
and scented with flowers; the composition of Shakespeare
is a forest, in which oaks extend their branches, and pinea
tower in the air, interspersed sometimes with weeds and
brambles, and sometimes giving shelter to myrtles and to
roses; filling the eye with awful pomp, and gratifying the
mind with endless diversity. Other poets display cabinets
of precious rarities, minutely finished, wrought into shape,
and polished into brightness. Shakespeare opens a mine
TO SHAKESPBARB 230
whicb eontKins gold and diamonds in unexhaustlble plenty,
though clouded by incrustations, debased by impurities, and
mingled with a mass of meaner minerals.
It has been much disputed, whether Shakespeare owed
his excellence to his own native force, or whether he had
the common helps of scholastick education, the precepts of
critical science, and the examples of ancient authours.
There has always prevailed a tradition, that Shakespeare
wanted learning, that he had no regular education, nor much
skill in the dead languages. Johnson, his friend, affirms,
that he had small Latin, and no Creek; who, besides that
he had no imaginable temptation to falsehood, wrote at a
time when the character and acquisitions of Shakespeare
were known to multitudes. His evidence ought therefore
to decide the controversy, unless some testimony of equal
force could be opposed.
Some have imagined, that they have discovered deep
learning in many imitations of old writers; but the ex-
amples which I have known urged, were drawn from books
translated in his time; or were such easy coincidences of
thought, as will happen to all who consider the same sub-
jects; or such remarks on life or axioms of morality as
float in conversation, and are transmitted through the world
in proverbial sentences.
I have found it remarked, that, in this important sen-
tence. Go before, I'll folloiti. we read a translation of, /
prae, sequar. I have been told, that when Caliban, after
a pleasing dream, says, / cry'd to sleep again, the authour
imitates Anacrean, who had, like every other man, the same
wish on the same occasion.
There are a few passages which may pass for imitations,
but so few, that the exception only confirms the rule; he
obtained them from accidental quotations, or by oral com-
munication, and as he used what he had, would have used
more if he had obtained it.
The Comedy of Errors is confessedly taken from the
Meniechmi of Plautus; from the only play of Ptautus which
was then in English. What can be more probable, than that
he who copied that, would have copied more ; but that those
whicb were not translated weic inaccessible?
Ml SAMn^. JOHNSON
Whether he knew the modern languages is uncertain.
That his plays have some French scenes proves but little;
he might easily procure them to be written, and probably,
even though he had known the language in the common
degree, he could not have written it without assistance. In
the story of Romeo and Juliet he is observed to have fol-
lowed the English translation, where it deviates from the
Italian; but this on the other part proves nothing against
his knowledge of the original. He was to copy, not what
he knew himself, but what was known to his audience.
It is most likely that he had learned LaHn sufficiently to
make him acquainted with construction, but that he never
advanced to an easy perusal of the Roman authours. Con-
cerning his skill in modem languages, I can find no suf-
ficient ground of determination; but as no imitations of
French or Italian authours have been discovered, though
the Italian poetry was then high in esteem, I am inclined
to believe, that he read little more than English, and chose
for his fables only such tales as he found translated.
That much knowledge is scattered over his works is very
justly observed by Pope, but it is often such knowledge as
books did not supply. He that will understand Shakespeare,
must not be content to study him in the closet, he must
look for his meaning sometimes among the sports of the
field, and sometimes among the inanufactiires of the shop.
There is however proof enough that he was a very dili-
gent reader, nor was our language then so indigent of books,
but that he might very liberally indulge his curiosity with-
out excursion into foreign literature. Many of the Roman
authours were translated, and some of the Greek; the ref-
ormation had filled the kingdom with theological learning;
most of the topicks of human disquisition had found English
writers; and poetry had been cultivated, not only with dili-
gence, but success. This was a stock of knowledge suf-
ficient for a mind so capable of appropriating and improv-
ing it.
But the greater part of his excellence was the product
of his own genius. He found the English stage in a state
of the utmost rudeness; no essays either in tragedy or
comedy had appeared, from which it could be discovered
to what degree of delight either one or other might be
carried. Neither character nor dialogue were yet under-
stood. Shakespeare may be truly said to have introduced
them both amongst us, and in some of his happier scenes
to have carried them both to the utmost height.
By what gradations of improvement he proceeded, is not
easily known; for the chronology of his works is yet un-
settled, Rowe is of opinion, that perhaps we arc not to
look for his beginning, like those of other writers, in his least
perfect works; art had so little, and nature so large a share
in what he did, that for otight I know, says he, the per-
formances of his youth, as they were Ike most t'igorous,
were the best. But the power of nature is only the power
of using to any certain purpose the materials which dili-
gence procures, or opportunity supplies. Nature gives no
man knowledge, and when images are collected by study and
experience, can only assist in combining or applying them.
Shakespeare, however favoured by nature, could impart only
what he had learned; and as he must increase his ideals, like
other mortals, by gradual acquisition, he, like them, grew
wiser as he grew older, could display life better, as he knew
it more, and instruct with more efficacy, as he was himself
mare amply instructed.
There is a vigilance of observation and accuracy of dis-
tinction which books and precepts cannot confer; from this
almost all original and native excellence proceeds, Shake-
speare must have looked upon mankind with perspicacity,
in the highest degree curious and attentive. Other writers
borrow their characters from preceding writers, and diver-
sify them only by the accidental appendages of present man-
ners; the dress is a little varied, but the body is the same.
Our authour had both matter and form to provide; for ex-
cept the characters of Chaucer, to whom I think he Is not
much indebted, there were no writers in English, and per-
haps not many in other modern languages, which shewed
life in its native colours.
The contest about the original benevolence or malignity
of man had not yet commenced. Speculation had not yet
attempted to analyse the mind, to trace the passions to their
wurces, to unfold the seminal principles of vice and virtue.
ttl BAMUHL JOHNSOW
or sound the depths of the heart for the motiTcs of acdoBj
All those enquiries, which from that time that hum
nature became the fashionable study, have been madt
sometimes with nice discernment, but often with idle sub.
tilty, were yet unatteropled. The tales, with which the,
infancy of learning was satisfied, exhibited only the super-
ficial appearances of action, related the events but omitted'
tlie causes, and were formed for such as delighted in wonden
rather than in truth. Mankind was not then to be studied
in the closet ; he that would know the world, was under tht
necessity of gleaning his own remarks, by mingling as be
could in its business and amusements.
Boyle congratulated himself upon his high birth, because,
it favoured his curiosity, by facilitating his access. Shakf
speare had no such advantage ; he came to London a Bcedy
adventurer, and lived for a time by very mean employment!,.
Many works of genius and learning have been performed ta
states of life, that appear very little favourable to thought
or to enquiry; so many, that he who considers them i
cllned to think that he sees enterprise and perseverance pre*
dominating over all external agency, and bidding help Bnd
hindrance vanish before them. The genius of Skakespeart
was not to be depressed by the weight of poverty, nor limited
by the narrow conversation to which men in want ara in-
evitably condemned; the incumbrances of his fortune wart
shaken from his mind, as dewdrops from a Uok's mane.
Though he had so many difficulties to encounter, and ao
little assistance to surmount them, he has been able to
obtain an exact knowledge of many modes of life, and man]^
casts of native dispositions; to vary them with great mul-t;
tiplicity; to mark them by nice distinctions: and to shew
them in full view by proper combinations, In this part o'
his performances he had none to imitate, but has himself
been imitated by all succeeding writers; and it may b«
doubted, whether from all his successors more maxims of
theoretical knowledge, or more rules of practical prudence,
can be collected, than he alone has given to his country.
Nor was his attention confined to the aclions of men;
he was an exact surveyor of the inanimate world;
descriptions have always some peculiarities, gathered by
TO SHAKESPEARE 243
mplating things as they really exist. It may be observed,
fliat the oldest poets of many nations preserve their repu-
tation, and that the following generations of wit, after a
short celebrity, sink into oblivion. The first, whoever they
be, must take their sentiments and descriptions immediately
from knowledge ; the resemblance is therefore just, their
descriptions are verified by every eye, and their sentiments
acknowledged by every breast. Those whom their fame in-
vites to the same studies, copy partly them, and partly nature,
till the books of one age gain such authority, as to stand
in the place of nature to another, and imitation, always
deviating a Httie, becomes at last capricious and casual.
Shakespeare, whether life or nature be his subject, shews
plainly, that he has seen with his own eyes; he gives the
image which he receives, not weakened or distorted by
the intervention of any other mind; the ignorant feel his
representations to be just, and the learned see that they are
Perhaps it would not be easy to find any authour. except
Homer, who invented so much as Shakespeare, who so much
advanced the studies which he cuUivated, or effused so much
novelty upon his age or country. The form, the characters,
the language, and the shows of the English drama are his.
He seeitu, says Deunis, to have been Ike very original of our
English tragical harmony, that is, the harmony of blank
verse, diversified often by dissyllable and trissyllable termina-
tions. For the diversity distinguishes it from heroick har-
mony, and by bringing if nearer to common use makes it
more proper to gain attention, and more fit for action and
dialogue. Such verse we make when we are writing prose;
we make such verse in common conversation.
I know not whether this praise is rigorously just. The
dissyllable termination, which the critic rightly appropriates
to the drama, is to be found, though, I think, not in Gor-
boduc which is confessedly before our author: yet in
Hieronnymo, of which the date is not certain, but which
there is reason to believe at least as old as his earliest plays.
This however is certain, that he is the first who taught either
tragedy or comedy to please, there being no theatrical
fifc^ t>t any older writer, of which the name is known, ex-
»
^
SASfUEL JOHKSOIV
cept to aotSqnaries and collectors of books, wbich are sought
because ihey are scarce, aiid would not have been scarce,
had they been much esteemed.
To him we must ascribe the praise, unless Spenser may
divide it with him, of having first discovered tg how much
smoothness and harmony the English language could be
toftcned. He has speeches, perhaps sometimes scenes, which
have all the delicacy of Rowe, without his effeminacy. He
endeavours indeed commonly to strike by the force and
vigour of his dialogue, but he never executes his purpose
better, than when he tries to sooth by softness.
Vet it must be at last confessed, that as we owe every
thing to him, he owes something to us; that, if much of
hii praise is paid by perception and judgement, much is
llkewine given by custom and veneration. We fix our eyes
Upon his graces, and turn them from his deformities, and
endure in hipn what we should in another loath or despise.
If we endured without praising, respect for the father of ouf
drama might excuse us; but I have seen, in the book of some
modern crilick, a collection of anomalies, which shew that
lie has corrupted language by every mode of depravation,
but which hilt admirer has accumulated as a monument of
litinour.
He hai scenes of undoubted and perpetual excellence,
but perhaps not one play, which, if it were now exhibited as
the work of a contemporary writer, would be heard to
the conclusion. I am indeed far from thinking, that his
works were wrought to his own ideas of perfection;
when they were such as would satisfy the audience,
they satisfied the writer. It is seldom that authours,
though more studious of fame than Shakespeare, rise much
ibove the stnmlard of their ovm age ; to add a little of what
Is best will always he sufficient for present praise, and
thojir who find themselves exalted into fame, are willing to
credit their encoiuinstx, and to gipare the labour of contcnd-
ItiR with lhem»el\-e».
It does nol apj^csr. that Shi:)!fspeare thought his works
Wiirthv of posterity, that he levied any ideal tribute upon
(ulure limes, or h«d any further prospect, than of present
popularity and present proSL When his plays had beea
TO SHAKESPEAEE US
ted, his hope was at an end; he solicited no addition of
lonour from the reader. He therefore made no scruple to
repeat the same jests in many dialogues, or to entangle dif-
ferent plots by the same knot of perplexity, which may be
at least forgiven him, by those who recollect, that of Con-
greve's four comedies, two are concluded by a marriage in
a mask, by a deception, which perhaps never happened, and
which, whether likely or not, he did not invent.
So careless was this great poet of future fame, that,
though he retired to ease and plenty, while he was yet little
declined into the vale of years, before he could be disgusted
with fatigue, or disabled by infirmity, he made no collection
of his works, nor desired to rescue those that had been al-
ready published from the depravations that obscured them,
or secure to the rest a better destiny, by giving them to the
world in their genuine state.
Of the plays which bear the name of Shakespeare in the
late editions, the greater part were not published till about
seven years after his death, and the few which appeared in
his life are apparently thrust into the world without the
care of the authour, and therefore probably without his
knowledge.
Of all the publishers, clandestine or professed, their neg-
ligence and unskilfulness has by the late revisers been
sufficiently shown. The faults of all are indeed numerous
and gross, and have not only corrupted many passages per-
haps beyond recovery, but have brought others into sus-
picion, which are only obscured by obsolete phraseology, or
by the writer's unskilfulness and affectation. To alter is
more easy than to explain, and temerity is a more common
quality than diligence. Those who saw that they must em-
ploy conjecture to a certain degree, were willing to indulge
it a little further. Had the author published his own works,
we should have sat quietly down to disentangle his in-
tricacies, and clear his obscurities; but now we tear
what we cannot loose, and eject what we happen not to
understand.
The faults are more than could have happened without the
concurrence of many causes. The stile of Shakespeare was
m itself ungrammatical, perplexed and obscure; his works
MB SAMUEL JOnSSOSI
were transcribed for the players by those who may be
supposed (o have seldom understood ihem ; they were trans-
mitted by copiers equally unskilful, who still multiplied
en-ours; they were perhaps sometimes mutilated by the
actors, for the sake of shortening the speeches; and were
at last printed without correction of the press.
In this state they remained, not as Or. WarbHrSon sap^
poses, because they were unregarded, but because the editor's
art was not yet applied to modem languages, and our an-
cestors were accustomed to so much negligence of Engluh
printers, that they could very patiently endure it. At last an
edition was undertaken by Rowe; not because a poet was
to be published by a poet, for Rowe seems to have thought
very little on correction or explanation, but that oaf
authour's works might appear like those of his fraternity,
with the appendages of a life and recommendatory preface.
Roiee has been clamorously blamed for not performing what
he did not undertake, and it is time that justice be dona
him, by confessing, that though he seems to have had no
thought of corruption beyond the printer's errours. yet
he has made many emendations, if they were not made bet
fore, which his successors have received without acknowl-
edgement, and which, if they had produced them, would have
filled pages and pages with censures of the stupidity by
which the faults were committed, with displays of the ab*
surdities which they involved, with ostentatious expositions
of the new reading, and self congratulations on the happiness
of discovering it.
Of Rowe, as of all the editors, I have preserved tho
preface, and have likewise retained the authour's life, though
not written with much elegance or spirit ; it relates however
what is now to be known, and therefore deserves to pass
through all succeeding publications.
The nation had been for many years content enough with
Mr. Rowe's performance, when Mr. Pope made them afr-
quainted with the true state of Shakespeare's text, shewed
that it was extremely corrupt, and gave reason to hope rlut
there were means of reforming it. He collated the old
copies, which none had thought to examine before, and re-
stored many lines to their integrity; but, by x very conk*
TO SHAKESPEARE
247
T^eadious criticism, he rejected whatever he disliked, and
thought more of amputation than of cure.
I know not why he is commended by Dr. Warburlon for
distinguishing the genuine from the spurious plays. In
this choice he exerted no judgement of his own; the plays
which he received, were given by Hemings and Condel,
the first editors; and those which he rejected, though, ac-
cording to the ''centiousness of the press in those times,
they were printed during Shakespeare's life, with his
name, had been omitted by his friends, and were never added
to his works before the edition of 1664, from which they were
copied by the later printers.
This was a work which Pope seems to have thought un-
worthy of his abilities, being not able to suppress his con-
tempt of the dull duty of an editor. He understood but
half his undertaking. The duty of a collator is indeed dull, .,
yet, like other tedious tasks, is very necessary; but an
emendatory crilick would ill discharge his duty, without
qualities very different from dullness. In perusing a cor-
rupted piece, he must have before him all possibilities of
meaning, with all possibilities of expression. Such must be
his comprehension of thought, and such his copiousness of
language. Out of many readings possible, he must be able
to select that which best suits with the state, opinions, and
modes of language prevailing in every age, and with his
authour's particular cast of thought, and turn of expression.
Such must he his knowledge, and such his taste. Con-
jectural criticism demands more than humanity possesses,
and he that exercises it with most praise has very frequent
need of indulgence. Let us now be told no more of the dull
duty of an editor.
Confidence is the common consequence of success. They
whose excellence of any kind has been loudly celebrated, arc
ready to conclude, that their powers are universal. Pope's
edition fell below his own expectations, and he was so much
' offended, when he was found to have left any thing for others
to do, that he past the latter part of his life in a state of
hostility with verbal criticism.
I have retained all his notes, that no fragment of so great
L a writer may be lost;; his preface, valuable alike for elegance
218 SAMUEL JOHNSON
of composition and justness of remark, and containing a
general criticism on his authour, so extensive, that Uttle can
be added, and so exact, that little can be disputed, every
editor has an interest to suppress, but that every reader
would demand its insertion.
Pope was succeeded by Theobald, a man of narrow coni-
prehension and small acquisitions, with no native and intrin-
sick splendour of genius, with little of the artificial light o{
learning, but zealous for minute accuracy, and not negligent
in pursuing it He collated the ancient copies, and rectified
many errours. A man so anxiously scrupulous might hav«
been expected to do more, hut what little he did was com-
monly right.
In his report of copies and editions he is not to be trusted,
without examination. He speaks sometimes indefinitely of
copies, when he has only one. In his enumeration of
editions, he mentions the two first folios as of high,
the third folio as of middle authority ; but the truth is, that
the first is equivalent to all others, and that the rest only
deviate from it by the printer's negligence. Whoever has
any of the folios has all, excepting those diversities which
mere reiteration of editions will produce. I collated them
all at the beginning, but afterwards used only the first.
Of his notes I have generally retained those which he
retained himself in his second edition, except when they
were confuted by subsequent annoiators, or were too minute
to merit preservation. I have sometimes adopted his restora-
tion of a comma, without inserting the panegyrick in which
he celebrated himself for his atchievement. The exuberant
excrescence of his diction I have often lopped, his trium-
phant exultations over Pope and Rowe I have sometimes
suppressed, and his contemptible ostentation I have fre-
quently concealed; but I have in some places shewn him, as
he would have shewn himself, for the reader's diversion,
that the inflated emptiness of some notes may justify or ex*
cuse the contraction of the rest.
Theobald, thus weak and ignorant, thus mean and faith-
less, thus petulant and ostentatious, by the good luck of hav-
ing Pope for his enemy, has escaped, and escaped alone, with
reputation, from this underUking. So willingly docs the
TO SHAKESPEAHB
249
world support those who solicite favour, against those who
command reverence ; and so easily ts he praised, whom no
man can envy.
Our authour fell then into the hands of Sir Thomas
Hanmer, the Oxford editor, a man, in my opinion, eminently
qualified by nature for such studies. He had, what is the
first requisite to emendatory criticism, that intuition by
which the poet's intention is immediately discovered, and
that dexterity of intellect which despatches its work by the
easiest means. He had undoubtedly read much; his ac-
quaintance with customs, opinions, and traditions, seems tg
have been large; and he is often learned without shew. He
seldom passes what he does not understand, without an at-
tempt to find or to make a meaning, and sometimes hastily
makes what a little more attention would have found. He
is solicitous to reduce to grammar, what he could not he
sure that his authour intended to be grammatical. Shake-
speare regarded more the series of ideas, than of words; j
and his language, not being designed for the reader's desk, j
was all that he desired it to be, if it conveyed his meaning |
to the audience.
Hanmer's care of the metre has been too violently cen-
sured. He found the measures reformed in so many pas-
sages, by the silent labours of some editors, with the silent
acquiescence of the rest, that he thought himself allowed to
extend a little further the license, which had already been
carried so far without reprehension; and of his corrections
in general, it must be confessed, that they are often just, and
made commonly with the least possible violation of the text.
But, by inserting his emendations, whether invented or
borrowed, into the page, without any notice of varying copies,
he has appropriated the labour of his predecessors, and made
his own edition of little authority. His confidence indeed,
both in himself and others, was too great; he supposes all
to be right that was done by Pope and Theobald; he seems
not to suspect a critick of fallibility, and it was but reason-
able that he should claim what he so liberally granted.
As he never writes without careful enquiry and diligent
consideration, I have received all his notes, and believe that
cyeiy reader will wish for more.
MO SAMUEL JOHNSON
Of the last editor it is more difGcult to speak. Respect ii
due to high place, tenderness to living reputation, and ven-
eration to genius and learning.; but he cannot be justly
offended at that liberty of which he has himself bo frequently
given an example, nor very solicitous what is thought o£
notes, which he ought never to have considered as part * *
his serious employments, and which, I suppose, since the
ardour of composition is remitted, he no longer numbers
among his happy effusions.
The original and predominant errour of his commentary,
is acquiescence in his first thoughts ; that precipitation whicU
is produced by consciousness of quick discernment; and that
confidence which presumes to do, by surveying the surface
what labour only can perform, by penetrating the bottom.
His notes exhibit sometimes perverse interpretations, and
sometimes improbable conjectures; he at one time gives
the authour more profundity of meaning, than the sentence
admits, and at another discovers absurdities, where the senss
is plain to every other reader. But his emendations ara
likewise often happy and just; and his interpretation of
obscure passages learned and sagacious.
Of his notes, I have commonly rejected those, against
which the general voice of the publick has exclaimed, or
which their own incongruity immediately condemns, and
which, I suppose, the authour himself would desire to bo
forgotten. Of the rest, to part I have given the highest
approbation, by inserting the offered reading in the text;
part I have left to the judgment of the reader, as doubtful,
though specious; and part I have censured without reserve,
but I am sure without bitterness of malice, and, I hpp<^
without wantonness of insult.
It is no pleasure to me, in revising my volumes, to observ
how much paper is wasted in confutation. Whoever con-
siders the revolutions of learning, and the various questions
of greater or less importance, upon which wit and reason
have exercised their powers, must lament the unsuccessful-
ness of enquiry, and the slow advances of truth, when h«
reflects, that great part of the labour of every writer is
only the destruction of tho^e that went before him. The first
care of the builder of a new system, is to dcmolieh th«
TO SHAKESPEARE 251
jiricks which are standing. The chief desire of him that
""comments an authour, is to shew how much other commen-
tators have corrupted and obscured him. Tlie opinions
prevalent in one age, as truths above the reach of con-
tWversy, are confuted and rejected in another, and rise
again to reception in remoter times. Thus the human mind
ja kept in motion without progress. Thus sometimes truth
and errour, and sometimes contrarieties of errour, take
each other's place by reciprocal invasion. The tide of
seeming knowledge which is poured over one generation,
retires and leaves another naked and barren ; the sudden
meteors of intelligence which for a while appear to shoot
their beams into the regions of obscurity, on a sudden
withdraw their lustre, and leave mortals again to grope
their way.
These elevations and depressions of renown, and the con-
tradictions to which all improvers of knowledge must for
ever be exposed, since they are not escaped by the highest
and brightest of mankind, may surely be endured with
patience by criticks and annotators, who can rank them-
selves but as the satellites of their authours. How canst
thou beg for life, says Achilles to his captive, when thou
knowest that thou art now to suffer only what must another
day be suffered by AcliillcsF
Dr. Warbitrton had a name sufficient to confer celebrity
on those who could exalt themselves into antagonists, and
his notes have raised a clamour too ioud to be distinct. His
chief assailants are the authours of the Canons of criticism
and of the Review of Shakespeare's lext; of whom one
ridicules bis errours with aii'y petulance, suitable enough to
the levity of the controversy; the other attacks them with
gloomy malignity, as if he were dragging to justice an
assassin or incendiary. The one stings like a fly, sucks a
little blood, takes a gay flutter, and returns for more; the
other bites like a viper, and would be glad to leave infiam-
mations and gangrene behind him. When I think on one,
with his confederates, I remember the danger of Coriolanus,
who was afraid that girls with spits, and bays with stones,
should slay him in puny battle; when the other crosses my
magiaatioti, I remember the prodigy in Macbeth,
^
SAMUEL JOHNSON
Let me however do them justice. One is a wit, and one a,
scholar. They have both shown acuteness suflScient in the
discovery of faults, and have both advanced some probable
interpretations of obscure passages; but when they aspire
to conjecture and emendation, it appears how falsely we all
estimate our own abilities, and the little which they have
been able to perform might have taught them more candour
to the endeavours of others.
Before Dr, IVarburton's edition. Critical observatimts on
Shakespeare had been published by Mr. Upton, a man skilled
in languages, and acquainted with boots, but who seems to
have had no great vigour of genius or nicety of taste. Many
of his explanations are curious and useful, but he likewise,
though he professed to oppose the licentious confidence of
editors, and adhere to the old copies, is unable to restrain
the rage of emendation, though his ardour is ill seconded
by his skill. Every cold erapirick, when his heart is ex-
panded by a successful experiment, swells into a theorist^
and the laborious collator at some unlucky moment frolicks
in conjecture.
Critical, historical and explanatory notes have been like-
wise published upon Shakespeare by Dr. Grey, whose dili-
gent perusal of the old English writers has enabled him
to make some useful observations. What he undertook he
has well enough performed, but as he neither attempts
judicial nor emendatory criticism, he employs rather bis
memory than his sagacity. It were to be wished that all
would endeavour to imitate his modesty who have not been
able to surpass his knowledge,
I can say with great sincerity of all my predecessors, what
I hope will hereafter be said of me, that not one has left
Shakespeare without improvement, nor is there one to whom
I have not been indebted for assistance and information.
Whatever I have taken from them it was my intention to
refer to its original autbour, and it is certain, that what I
have not given to another, I believed when I wrote it to be
my own. In some perhaps I have been anticipated; but if
I am ever found to encroach upon the remarks of any other
commentator, I am willing that the honour, be it more or
less, should be transferred to the first claimant, for his right,
and his alone, stands above dispute ; the second can prove
his pretensions only to himself, nor can himself always dis-
tinguish invention, with sufficient certainty, from recollec-
They have alJ been treated by me with candour, which
they have not been careful of observing to one another. It
is not easy to discover from what cause the acrimony of a
scholiast can naturally proceed. The subjects to be discussed
by him are of very small importance; they involve neither
property nor liberty ; nor favour the interest of sect or party.
The various readings of copies, and different interpretations
of a passage, seem to be questions that might exercise the
wit, without engaging the passions. But, whether it be, that
smaU things make mean men proud, and vanity catches small
occasions; or that all contrariety of opinion, even in those
that can defend it no longer, makes proud men angry; there
is often found in commentaries a spontaneous strain of in-
vective and contempt, more eager and venomous than is
vented by the most furious controvertist in politicks against
those whom he is hired to defame.
Perhaps the lightness of the matter may conduce to the
vehemence of the agency ; when the truth to be investigated
is so near to inexistence, as to escape attention, its bulk is
to be enlarged by rage and exclamation: That to which all
would be indifferent in its original state, may attract notice
when the fate of a name is appended to it. A commentator
has indeed great temptations to supply by turbulence what
he wants of dignity, to beat his little gold to a spacious sur-
face, to work that to foam which no art or diligence can
exalt to spirit
The notes which I have borrowed or written are either
illustrative, by which difficulties are explained; or judicial
by which faults and beauties are remarked; or emendatory,
by which depravations are corrected.
The explanations transcribed from others, if I do not sub-
join any other interpretation, I suppose commonly to he
right, at least I intend by acquiescence to confess, that I
have nothing better to propose.
tu SAMUBC vomismr
After the labours of all the editors, I found many passages
which appeared to me likely to obstruct the greater number
gf readers, and thought it my duty to facilitate their passage.
It is impossible for an expositor not to write too little for
some, and too much for others. He can only judge what
is necessary by his own experience ; and how long soever
he may deliberate, will at last explain many lines which
the learned will think impossible to be mistaken, and omit
many for which the ignorant will want his help. These
are censures merely relative, and must be quietly endured.
I have endeavoured to be neither superfluously copious,
nor scrupulously reserved, and hope that I have made
my authour's meaning accessible to many who before
were frighted from perusing him. and contributed some-
thing to the publick, by diffusing innocent and rational
pleasure.
The compleat explanation of an authour not systematick
and consequential, but desultory and vagrant, abounding in
casual allusions and light hints, is not to be expected from any
single scholiast. All personal reflections, when names are
suppressed, must he in a fewr years irrecoverably obliterated;
and customs, too minute to attract the notice of law, such as
modes of dress, formalities of conversation, rules of visits,
disposition of furniture, and practices of ceremony, which
naturally find places in familiar dialogue, are so fugitive and
unsubstantial, that they are not easily retained or recovered.
What can be known, will be collected by chance, from the
recesses of obscure and obsolete papers, perused commonly
with some other view. Of this knowledge every man has
some, and none has much ; but when an authour has engaged
the publick attention, those who can add any thing to his
illustration, communicate their discoveries, and time produces
what had eluded diligence,
To time I have been obliged to resign many passageSf
which, though I did not understand them, will perhaps here-
after be explained, having, I hope, illustrated some, which
others have neglected or mistaken, sometimes by short re-
marks, or marginal directions, such as every editor has added
at his will, and often by comments more laborious than the
matter will seem to deserve ; but that which is most difficult
TO SHAKESPEARE Z55
1 always most important, and to an editor nothing is a
We by which his authour is obscured.
The poetical beauties or defects I have not been very dili-
gent to observe. Some plays have more, and some fewer
Judicial observations, not in proportion to their difference of
merit, but because I gave this part of my design to chance
and to caprice. The reader, I believe, is seldom pleased to
find his opinion anticipated; it Is natural to delight more in
what we find or make, than in what we receive. Judgement,
like other faculties, is improved by practice, and its advance-
ment is hindered by submission to dictatorial decisions, as
the memory grows torpid by the use of a table book. Some
initiation is however necessary; of all skill, part is infused
by precept, and part is obtained by habit; I have therefore
shewn so much as may enable the candidate of criticism to
discover the rest.
To the end of most plays, I have added short strictures,
containing a general censure of faults, or praise of excel-
lence ; in which I know not how much I have concurred
with the current opinion ; but 1 have not, by any affectation
of singularity, deviated from it. Nothing is minutely and
particularly examined, and therefore it is to be supposed,
that in the plays which are condemned there is much to be
praised, and in these which arc praised much to be con-
demned.
The part of criticism in which the whole succession of
editors has laboured with the greatest diligence, which has
occasioned the most arrogant ostentation, and excited the
keenest acrimony, is the emendation of corrupted passages,
to which the publick attention having been first drawn by the
violence of contention between Pope and Theobald, has been
continued by the persecution, which, with a kind of con-
spiracy, has been since raised against all the publishers of
Shakespeare.
That many passages have passed in a state of deprava-
tion through all the editions is indubitably certain ; of
these the restoration is only to be attempted by collation
of copies or sagacity of conjecture. The collator's province
is safe and easy, the conjecturcr's perilous and difficult.
■Yet as the greater part of the plays are extant only in
^
256 SAMUEL JOHNSON
one copy, the peril must not be avoided, nor the difficult
refused.
Of the readings which this emulation of unendment has
hitherto produced, some from the labours of every publisher
I have advanced into the text; those are to be considered as
in my opinion sufficiently supported; some I have rejected
without mention, as evidently erroneous; some 1 have left in
the notes without censure or approbation, as resting in
equipoise between objection and defence; and some, which
seemed specious but not right, I have inserted with a subse-
quent animadversion.
Having classed the observations of others, I was at last to
try what I could substitute for tlieir mistakes, and how X
could supply their omissions. I collated such copies :
could procure, and wished for more, but have not found the
collectors of these rarities very communicative. Of the
editions which chance or kindness put into my hands I have
given an enumeration, that I may not be blamed for neglect*
ing what I had not the power to do.
By examining the old copies, I soon found that the latep^
publishers, with all their boasts of diligence, suffered many
passages to stand unauthorised, and contented themselves
with RoTve's regulation of the text, even where they knew it to
be arbitrary, and with a little consideration might have found
it to be wrong. Some of these alterations are only the ejec-
tion of a word for one that appeared to him more elegant or
raore intelligible. These corruptions I have often silently
rectified; for the history of our language, and the true force
of our words, can only be preserved, by keeping the text of
authours free from adulteration. Others, and those very
frequent, smoothed the cadence, or regulated the mea;
on these I have not exercised the same rigour; if only a
word was transposed, or a particle inserted or omitted, I
have sometimes suffered the line to stand; for the ii
stancy of the copies is such, as that some liberties may be
easily permitted. But this practice I have not suffered tO'
proceed far, having restored the primitive diction wherever
it could for any reason be preferred.
The emendations, which comparison of copies supplied, 3
have inserted in the text; sometimes where the itnprovemEnt
TO SHAKESPEAEE 257
was slight, without notice, and sometimes with an account of
the reasons of the change.
Conjecture, though it be sometimes unavoidable, I have not
wantonly nor licentiously indulged. It has been my settled
principle, that the reading of the ancient books is probably
true, and therefore is not to be disturbed for the sake of
elegance, perspicuity, or mere improvement of the sense.
For though much credit is not due to the fidelity, nor any to
the judgement of the first publishers, yet they who had the
copy before their eyes were more likely to read it right, than
we who read it only by imagination. But it is evident that
they have often made strange mistakes by ignorance or neg-
ligence, and that therefore something may be properly at-
tempted by criticism, keeping the middle way between pre-
sumption and timidity.
Such criticism I have attempted to practice, and where
any passage appeared inextricably perplexed, have endeav-
oured to discover how it may be recalled to sense, with least
violence. But my first labour is, always to turn the old text
on every side, and try if there be any interstice, through
which light can find its way ; nor would Hitefius himself con-
demn me, as refusing the trouble of research, for the ambi-
tion of alteration. In this modest industry I have not been
unsuccessful. I have rescued many lines from the violations
of temerity, and secured many scenes from the inroads of
correction. I have adopted the Roman sentiment, that it is
more honourable to save a citizen, than to kill an enemy, and
have been more careful to protect than to attack.
I have preserved the common distribution of the plays
into acts, though I believe it to be in almost all the plays
void of authority. Some of those which are divided in the
later editions have no division in the first folio, and some
that are divided in the folio have no division in the preced-
ing copies. The settled mode of the theatre requires four
intervals in the play, but few, if any, of our authour's com-
positions can be properly distributed in that manner. An act
is so much of the drama as passes without intervention of
time or change of place. A pause makes a new act. In
every real, and therefore in every imitative action, the in-
Kr\'als may be more or fewer, the restriction of five acts
(») Hc— Vol. as
^
m SAHUSL JOHNSOK
being accidental and arbitrary. This Shakespeare knew;
and this he practised; his plays were written, and at firs
printed in one unbroken continuity, and ought now to \
exhibited with short pauses, interposed as often as the sceiu
is changed, or any considerable time is required to ;
method would at once quell a thousand absurdities
In restoring the author's works to their integrity, I havi
considered the punctuation as wholly in my power; for v
could be their care of colons and commas, who corrupted
words and sentences. Whatever could be done by adjusting
points is therefore silently performed, in some plays i
much diligence, in others with less ; it is hard to keep a bu^
eye steadily fixed upon evanescent atoms, or a discursive;
mind upon evanescent truth.
The same liberty has been taken with a few particles, 01
other words of slight effect. I have sometimes inserted o
omitted them without notice, I have done that s
which the other editors have done always, and which indee<
the state of the text may sufficiently justify.
The greater part of readers, instead of blaming us f
passing trifles, will wonder that on mere trifles so much \ai
bour is expended, with such importance of debate, and such
Golemnity of diction. To these I answer with confidence, thai
they are judging of an art which they do not understand; ;
cannot much reproach them with their ignorance, nor prooW
ise that they would become in general, by learning criticism^
more useful, happier or wiser.
As I practised conjecture more, I learned to trust it less
and after I had printed a few plays, resolved to insert r
of my own readings in the text. Upon this caut
congratulate myself, for every day encreases my doubt (
my emendations.
Since I have confined my imagination to the margin, i|
must not be considered as very reprehensible, if I have suf-
fered it to play some freaks in its own dominion. There is i
danger in conjecture, if it be proposed as conjecture; anj
while the text remains uninjured, those changes may b«i
safely offered, which are not considered even by him f
offers them as necessary or safe.
If my readings are of little value, they have not beat o
r ih
TO SHAKESPEARE S9»
ttiously displayed or importunately obtruded. I could have
written longer notes, for the art of writing notes is not of
difficult attainment. The work is performed, first by railing
at the stupidity, negligence, ignorance, and asinine tastdess-
ness of the former editors, and shewing, from all that goes
before and all that follows, the inelegance and absurdity of
the old reading; then by proposing something which to
superficial readers would seem specious, but which the editor
rejects with indignation ; then by producing the true reading,
with a long paraphrase, and concluding with loud acclama-
tions on the discovery, and a sober wish for the advance-
ment and prosperity of genuine criticism.
All this may be done, and perhaps done sometimes with-
out impropriety. But I have always suspected that the read-
ing is right, which requires many words to prove it wrong;
and the emendation wrong, that cannot without so much
labour appear to be right. The justness of a happy restara-
tion strikes at once, and the moral precept may be well ap-
plied to criticism, quod dubilas ue jeceris.
To dread the sliore which he sees spread with wrecks, is
natural to the sailor. I had before my eye, so many critical
adventures ended in miscarriage, that caution was forced
upon me. I encountered in every page Wit struggling with
its own sophistry, and L,earning confused by the multi-
plicity of its views. I was forced to censure those whom I
admired, and could not but reflect, while I was dispossessing
their emendations, how soon the same fate might happen to
my own, and how many of the readings which I have cor-
rected may be by some other editor defended and established.
Ctilicks, I saw. that other's names efface,
And fix their own. with labour, in the place;
Their own, like others, aoon their place resign'd.
Or dlsappear'd, and left Iho first behind.
Pope.
That a conjectural critick should often be mistaken, cannot
l»e wonderful, either to others or himself, if it be considered,
that in his art there is no system, no principal and axiomat-
ical truth that regulates subordinate positions. His chance
of eriour is renewed at every attempt; an oblique view of
SAMUEL JOHNSON
the passage, a slight misapprehension of a phrase, a casual
inattention to the parts connected, is sufficient to make him
not only fails, but fail ridiculously; and when he succeeds
best, he produces perhaps but one reading of many probable,
and he that suggests another will always be able to dispute
his claims.
It is an unhappy state, in which danger is hid under
pleasure. The allurements of emendation are scarcely re-
sistible. Conjecture has all the joy and all the pride of in-
vention, and he that has once started a happy change, is
too much delighted to consider what objections may rise
against it.
Yet conjectural criticism has been of great use in the
learned world; nor is it my intention to depreciate a study,
that has exercised so many mighty minds, from the revival of
learning to our own age, from the Bishop of Aleria to
English Bentley. The criticks on ancient authours have, in
the exercise of their sagacity, many assistances, which the
editor of Shakespeare is condemned to want. They are
employed upon grammatical and settled languages, whose
construction contributes so much to perspicuity, that Homer
has fewer passages unintelligible than Chaucer. The words
have not only a known regimen, but invariable quantities,
which direct and confine the choice. There are commonly
more manuscripts than one; and they do not often conspire
in the same mistakes. Yet Scaliger could confess to Sal-
masius bow little satisfaction his emendations gave him.
Illuduttt nobis conjeclurte nostra, quorum nos pudet, postea-
quant in meliores codices incidimus. And Lipsius could
complain, that criticks were making faults, by trying to
remove them, Ut olitn vitHs, ita nunc remediis laboratur.
And indeed, ■where mere conjecture is to be used, the emenda-
tions of Scaliger and Lipsius, notwithstanding their wonder-
ful sagacity and erudition, are often vague and disputable,
like mine or Theobald's.
Perhaps I may not be more censured for doing wrong, than
for doing little ; for raising in the publick expectations, whidi
at last I have not answered. The expectation of ignorance
is indefinite, and that of knowledge is often tyrannical It
is hard to satisfy those who know not what to demand, os
TO SHAKESPEARE
those who demand by design what they think impossible lo
be done. I have indeed disappointed no opinion more than
my own ; yet I have endeavoured to perform my task with
no slight solicitude. Not a single passage in the whole work
has appeared to me corrupt, which I have not attempted to
restore; or obscure, which I have not endeavoured to illus-
trate. In many I have failed like others; and from many,
after all my efforts, I have retreated, and confessed the re-
pulse. I have not passed over, with afifected superiority,
what is equally difficult to the reader and to myself, but
where I could not instruct him, have owned my ignorance.
I might easily have accumulated a mass of seeming learn-
ing upon easy scenes ; but it ought not to be imputed to neg-
ligence, that, where nothing was necessary, nothing has been
done, or that, where others have said enough, I have said no
more.
Notes are often necessary, but they are necessary evils.
Let him, that is yet unacquainted with the powers of Shake-
speare, and who desires to feel the highest pleasure that the
drama can give, read every play from the first scene to the
last, with utter negligence of all his commentators. When
his fancy is once on the wing, let it not stoop at correction or
explanation. When his attention is strongly engaged, let it
disdain alike to turn aside to the name of Theobald and of
Pope. Let him read on through brightness and obscurity,
through integrity and corruption; let him preserve his com-
prehension of the dialogue and his interest in the fable.
And when the pleasures of novelty have ceased, let him at-
tempt exactness, and read the commentators.
Particular passages are cleared by notes, but the general
effect of the work is weakened. The mind is refrigerated by
interruption ; the thoughts are diverted from the principal
subject; the reader is weary, he suspects not why; and at
last throws away the book, which he has too diligently
studied.
Parts are not to be examined till the whole has been sur-
veyed; there is a kind of intellectual remoteness necessary
for the comprehension of any great work in its full design
and its true proportions; a close approach shews the smaller
es, but the beauty of the whole is discerned no longer.
I
BAMtTEL JOHNSON
It is not very grateful to consider how little (He soccessTow
editors has added to this anthour's power of pleasing.
He was read, admired, studied, and imitated, while he wa^
yet deformed with all the improprieties which ignorance and
neglect could accumulate upon him; while the reading was
yet not rectified, nor his allusions understood; yet then did
Dryden pronounce " that Shakespeare was the man, who,
of all modern and perhaps ancipnt poets, had the largest and
most comprehensive soul." All the images of nature were
Gtill present to him, and he drew them not laboriously, but
luckily: when he describes any thing, you more than see
it, you feel it too. Those who accuse him to have wanted
learning, give him the greater commendation: he was
naturally learned: he needed not the spectacles of books to
read nature; he looked inwards, and found her there. I
cannot say he is every where alike; were he so, I should do
him injury to compare him with the greatest of mankind.
He is many times fiat and insipid; his cotnick wit degenerat-
ing into clenches, his serious swelling into bombast. But
he is always great, when some great occasion is presented (o
him: No man can say, he ever had a fit subject for his
wit, and did not then raise himself as high above the rest
of poets,
" Quaotum lenta soleot inter wliurna cupresBi."
It is to be lamented, that such a writer should want A
commentary; that his language shouid become obsolete, or
his sentiments obscure. But it is vain to carry wishes be-
yond the condition of human things; that which must hap-
pen to all, has happened to Shakespeare, by accident and
time ; and more than has been suffered by any other writer
since the use of types, has been suffered by hiiq through
hit own negligence of fame, or perhaps by that superiority
of mind, which despised its own performances, when it
compared them with its powers, and judged those works
unworthy to be preserved, which the criticks of follow*
ing ages were to coniend for the fame of restoring am}
explaining.
Among these candidates of infcriour fame, I am DOW M
TO SHAKESPEARE 169
Stand the judgment of the publick; and wish that I could
confidently produce my commentary as equal to the en-
couragement which I have had the honour of receiving.
Every work of this kind is by its nature deficient, and I
should feel little solicitude about the sentence, were it to
be pronounced only by the skilful and the learned.
INTRODUCTION
TO THE PROPYLAEN
BY J. W. VON GOETHE. (1798)
THE youth, when Nature and Art attract him, thinks
that with a vigorous efTorl he can soon penetrate into
the innermost sanctuary; the man, after long wander-
ings, finds himself still in the outer court
Such an observation has suggested our title. It is only on
the step, in the gateway, the entrance, the vestibule, the
space between the outside and the inner chamber, betweoi
the sacred and the common, that we may ordinarily tarty
with our friends.
If the word Propylaea recalls particularly the structure
through which was reached the citadel of Athens and the
temple of Minerva, this is not inconsistent with our purpose;
but the presumption of intending to produce here a similar
work of art and splendor should not be laid to our charge.
The name of the place may be understood as symbolizing what
might have happened there; one may expect conversations
and discussions such as would perhaps not be unworthy of
that plae
Are lot thinkers, scholars, artists, in their best hours al-
lured to those regions, to dwell (at least in imagination)
among a people to whom a perfection which we desire but
never attain was natural, among whom in the course of time
and life, a culture developed in a beautiful continuity, which
to us appears only in passing fragments ? What modem nation
The Propylitn wis a periodical faunded Id Jaly. 1798. by Goethe ud I
bis Iri»nd Heinriih Meyer. During iU jhorl — !" -' -i- — -—
there were published in it, besidei the writingi
tribulions hy Sthillet and Humboldt, "
s «nd meihods of a
I this notable iatraduciiDD
hi! fundamenlfll ide«» on
3 made exprettly for the
INTRODUCTION TO PROPYLXEN 2SS
does not owe its artistic culture to the Greeks, and, in cer-
tain branches, what nation more than the German?
So much by way of excuse for the symbolic title, if indeed
an excuse be necessary. May the title be a reminder that
we are to depart as little as possible from classic ground;
may it, through its brevity and signification, modify the de-
mands of the friends of art whom we hope to interest
through the present work, which is to contain observations
and reflections concerning Nature and An by a harmonious
circle of friends,
,He who is called to be an artist will give careful heed to
everything around him; objects and their parts will attract
his attention, and by making practical use of such experience
he will gradually train himself to observe more sharply. He
will, in his early career, apply everything, so far as possible,
to his own advantage; later he will gladly make himself
serviceable to others. Thus we also hope to present and
relate to our readers many things which we regard as useful
and agreeable, things which, under various circumstances,
have been noted by us during a number of years.
But who will not willingly agree that pure observation is
more rare than is believed? We are apt to confuse our sensa-
tions, our opinion, our judgment, with what we experience, so
that we do not remain long in the passive attitude of the ob-
server, but soon go on to make reflections; and upon these no
greater weight can be placed than may be more or less
justified by the nature and quality of our individual intel-
lects.
In this matter we are able to gain stronger confidence
from our harmony with others, and from the knowledge that
we do not think and work alone, but in common. The per-
plexing doubt whether our method of thought belongs only
to us — a doubt which often comes over us when others ex-
press the direct opposite of our convictions — is softened,
even dispelled, when we find ourselves in agreement with
Others; only then do we go on rejoicing with assurance in
the possession of those principles which a long experience,
on our own part and on the part of others, has gradually
confirmed.
When several persons thus live united, so that they may^
GOETHE
e another friends, because they have a common Interest
1 bringing about their progressive cultivation and in advan-
cing towards closely related aims, then they may be certain
tliat they will meet again in the most varied ways, and that
even the courses which seamed to separate them froni one an-
other will nevertheless soon bring them happily together again.
Who has not experienced what advantages are afforded
in such cases by conversation ? But conversation is ephemer-
al ; and while the results of a mutual development are imper-
ishable, the memory of the means by which it was reached
disappears. Letters preserve better the stages of a progress
which friends achieve together; every moment of growth is
fixed, and if the result attained affords us agreeable satis-
faction, a look backward at the process of development is
instructive since it permits us to hope for an unflagging ad-
vance in the future.
Short papers, in which are set down from time to time one's
thoughts, convictions, and wishes, in order to find entertain-
ment in one's past self after a lapse of time, are excellent
auxiliary means for the development of oneself and of
Others, none of which should be neglected when one con-
siders the brief period allotted to life and the many obstacles
that stand in the way of every advance.
It is self evident that we are talking here particularly of
an exchange of ideas between such friends as are striving for
cultivation in the sphere of science and art; although life
in the world of affairs and industry should not lack similar
advantages.
In the arts and sciences, however, in addition to this dose
association among their votaries, a relation to the public is
as favorable as it is necessary. Wliatever of universal inter-
est one thinks or accomplishes belongs to the world, and the
world brings to maturity whatever it can utilize of the efforts
of the individual. The desire for approval which the author
feels is an impulse implanted by Nature to draw him toward
something higher ; he thinks he has attained the laurel wreath,
but soon becomes aware that a more laborious training of
every native talent is necessary in order to retain the public
favor ; though it may be attained for a short moment throi^^
iortune or accideat also.
INTRODUCTION TO PROPTLAEN
> relation of the author to his public is important in
early period ; even in later days he cannot dispense with
it. However little he may be fitted to teach others, he
wishes to share his thoughts with those whom he feels c
genial, but who are scattered far and wide in the world. By
this means he wishes to re-establish his relation with his old
friends, to continue it with new ones, and to gain in the
younger generation still others for the remainder of his life.
He wishes to spare youth the circuitous paths upon which
he himself went astray, and while observing and utilizing the
advantages of the present, to maintain the memory of his
praiseworthy earlier efforts.
With this serious view, a small society has been brought
together; may cheerfulness attend our undertakings, and
time may show whither we are bound.
The papers which we intend to present, though they are
composed by several authors, will, it is hoped, never be con-
tradictory in the main points, even though the methods of
thought may not be the same in all. No two persons regard
the world in exactly the same way, and different characters
will often apply in different ways a principle which they all
acknowledge. Indeed, a person is not always consistent with
himself in his views and judgments : early convictions must
give way to later ones. The individual opinions that a man
holds and expresses may stand all tests or not; the main thing
is that he continue on his way, true to himself and to others I
Much as the authors wish and hope to be in harmony with
one another and with a large part of the public, they must
not shut their eyes to the fact that from various quarters
many a discord will ring out. They must expect this all thd
more since they differ from prevailing opinions iti morB
than one point. Though far from wishing to dominate or
change the way of thinking of a tliird person, still they will
firmly express their own opinion, and, as circumstances dic-
tate, will avoid or take up a quarrel. On the whole, however,
they will adhere to one creed, and especially will they repeat
again and again those conditions which seem to them indis-
pensable in the training of an artist. Whoever takes an in-
terest in this matter, must be ready to take sides; otherwise
he does not deserve to be effective anywhere.
GOETHE
If, therefore, we promise to present reflections and ob-
servations coocerning Nature, we must 3t the same time
indicate that these remarks will chiefly have reference, first,
to plastic art ; then, to art in general ; finally, to the general
training of the artist.
The highest demand that is made on an artist is this: that
he be true to Nature, study her, imitate her, and produce
something that resembles her phenomena. How great, how
enormous, this demand is, is not always kept in mind; and
the true artist himself leams it by experience only, m the
course of his progressive development. Nature is separated
from Art by an enormous chasm, which genius itself is unable
to bridge without external assistance.
All that we perceive around us is merely raw material; if
it happens rarely enough that an artist, through instinct and
taste, through practice and experiment, reaches the point of
attaining the beautiful exterior of things, of selecting the
best from the good before him, and of producing at least an
agreeable appearance, it is still more rare, particularly in
modem times, for an artist to penetrate into the depths of
things as well as into the depths of his own soul, in order to
produce in his works not only something light and superfi-
cially effective, but, as a rival of Nature, to produce some-
thing spiritually organic, and to give his work of art a con-
tent and a form through which it appears both natural and
beyond Nature.
Man is the highest, the characteristic subject of plastic
art; to understand him, to extricate oneself from the laby-
rinth of his anatomy, a general knowledge of organic nature
is imperative. The artist should also acquaint himself
theoretically with inorganic bodies and with the general
operations of Nature, particularly if, as in the case of sound
and color, they are adaptable to the purposes of art; but
what a circuitous path he would be obliged to take if he
wanted to seek laboriously in the schools of the anatomist,
the naturalist, and the physicist, for that which serves his
purposes! It is, indeed, a question whether he would find
there what must be most important for him. Those men have
the entirely different needs of their own pupils to satisfy, so
that they cannot be expected to think of the limited and
INTRODUCTION TO PROPYLSeN 869
special needs of the artist. For that reason it is our inten-
tion to take a hand, and, even though we cannot see pros-
pects of completing the necessary work ourselves, both to
give a view of the whole and to begin the elaboration of
details.
The human figure cannot be understood merely through
observation of its surface; the interior must be laid bare,
its parts must be separated, the connections perceived, the
dififerences noted, action and reaction observed, the con-
cealed, constant, and fundamental elements of the phenomena
impressed on the mind, if one really wishes to contemplate
and imitate what moves before our eyes in living waves as
a beautiful, undivided whole. A glance at the surface of a
living being confuses the observer; we may cite here, as in
other cases, the tnie proverb, " One sees only what one
knows." For Just as a short-sighted man sees more clearly
an object from which he draws back than one to which he
draws near, because his intellectual vision comes to his aid,
so the perfection of observation really depends on knowl-
edge. How well an expert naturalist, who can also draw,
imitates objects by recognizing and emphasizing the import-
ant and significant parts from which is derived the character
of the whole!
Just as the artist is greatly helped by an exact knowledge
of the separate parts of the human figure, which he must
in the end regard again as a whole, so a general view, a side
glance at related objects, is highly advantageous, provided
the artist is capable of rising to ideas and of grasping the
close relationship of things apparently remote. Comparative
anatomy has prepared a general conception of organic
creatures; it leads us from form to form, and by observing
organisms closely or distantly related, we rise above them
all to see their characteristics in an ideal picture. If we
keep this picture in mind, we find that in observing objects
our attention takes a definite direction, that scattered facts
can he learned and retained more easily by comparison, that
I in the practice of art we can finally vie with Nature only
when we have learned from her, at least to some extent, her
I method of procedure in the creation of her works.
^^^^^ Furthermore, we woidd encourage the artist to gain
knowledge also af the inorganic world; this can be done all
tfae more easily since now we can conveniently and quickly
acquire knowledge of the mineral kingdom. The painter
needs some knowledge of stones in order to imitate their
characteristics; the sculptor and architect, in order to otilize
them; the cutter of precious stones cannot be without a
knowledge of their nature; the connoisseur and amateur,
too, will strive for such information.
Now that we have advised the artist to gain a conception
of the general operations of Nature, in order to become
acquainted with those which particuJarly interest him, partly
to develop himself in more directions, partly to understand
better that which concerns him ; wc shall add a few further
remarks on this significant point
Up to the present the painter has been able merely 6}
wonder at the physicist's theory of colors, without gaining
any advantage from it. Tlie natural feeling of the artist,
however, constant training, and a practical necessity led
him into a way of his own. He felt the vivid contrasts out
of the union of which harmony of color arises, he designated
certain characteristics through approximate sensations, he
had warm and cold colors, colors which express proximity,
others which express distance, and what not ; and thus in his
own way he brought these phenomena closer to the most gen-
eral laws of Nature. PerhapE the supposition is confirmed
that the operations of Nature in colors, as well as mag-
netic, electric, and other operations, depend upon a mutual
relation, a polarity, or whatever else we might call the two-
fold or manifold aspects of a distinct unity.
We shall make it our duty to present this matter in detail
and in a form comprehensible to the artist; and we can be
the more hopeful of doing something welcome to him. since
We shall be concerned only with explaining and tracing to
fundamental principles things which he has hitherto done
by instinct.
So much for what we hope to impart in regard to Nature;
now for what is most necessary in regard to Art,
Since the arrangement of this work proposes the presen-
tation of single treatises, some of these only in part, and
wnce it Is not our dc«ire to dissect a whole, but rather to
INTRODUCTIOK TO PROPYLXEN
build up a whole from many parts, it will be necessary to
present, as soon as possible and in a general summary, those
things which the reader will gradually find unfolded in our
detailed elaborations. We shall, therefore, be occupied first
with an essay on plastic art, in which the familiar rubrics
will be presented according to our interpretation and method.
Here it will be our main concern to emphasize the import-
ance of every branch of Art, and to show that the artist
must not neglect a single one, as has unfortunately often
happened, and still happens.
Hitherto we have regarded Nature as the treasure chamber
of material in general; now, however, we reach the import-
ant point where it is shown how Art prepares its materials
for itself.
When the artist takes any object of Nature, the object no
longer belongs to Nature; indeed, we can say that the artist
creates the object in that moment, by extracting from it all
that is significant, characteristic, interesting, or rattier by
putting into it a higher value. In this way finer proportions,
nobler forms, higher characteristics are, as it were, forced
upon the human figure; the circle of regularity, perfection,
signification, and completeness is drawn, in which Nature
gladly places her best possessions even though elsewhere in
her vast extent she easily degenerates into ugliness and loses
herself in indifference.
The same is true of composite works of art, of their sub-
ject and content, whether the theme be fable or history.
Happy the artist who makes no mistake in undertaking the
worlc, who knows how to choose, or rather to determine
what Is suitable for art! He who wanders uneasily among
scattered myths and far-stretching history in search of a
theme, he who wishes to be significantly scholarly or allcgor-
ically interesting, will often be checked in the midst of his
work by unexpected obstacles, or will miss his finest aim after
the completion of the work. He who does not speak clearly
to the senses, will not address himself clearly to the mind;
and we regard this point as so important, that we insert at
the very outset a more extended discussion of it.
A theme having been happily found or invented, it is sub-
jected to treatment which we would divide into the spiritual.
the sensuous, and the mechanical. The spiritual develops
tile subject according to its inner relations, it discovers sub-
ordinate motives; and, if we can at all judge the depth of an
artistic genius by the choice of subject, we can recognize in
his selection of themes his breadth, wealth, fullness, and
power of attraction. The sensuous treatment we should
define as that through which the work becomes thoroughly
comprehensible to the senses, agreeable, delightful, and
irresistible through its gentle charm. The mechanical treat-
ment, finally, is that which works upon given material
through any bodily organ, and thus brings the work into
existence and gives it reality.
While we hope to be useful to the artist in this way, and
earnestly wish that he may avail himself of advice and of
suggestions in his work, the disquieting observation is forced
upon us that every undertaking, like every man, is likely to
suffer just as much from its period as it is to derive occa-
sional advantage from it. and in our own case we cannot
altogether put aside the question concerning the reception
we are likely to meet with.
Everything is subject to constant change, and since certain
things cannot exist side by side, they displace one another.
This is true of kinds of knowledge, of certain methods of
instruction, of methods of representation, and of maxims.
The aims of men remain nearly always the same r they still
desire to become good artists or poets as they did centuries
ago; but the means through which the goal is reached are
not clear to everybody, and why should it be denied that
nothing would be more agreeable than to he able to carry
out joyfully a great design?
Naturally the public has a great influence upon Art, since
in return for its approval and its money it demands work
that may give satisfaction and immediate enjoyment; and
the artist will for the most part be ^lad to adapt himself to
it, for he also is a part of the public, he has received his
training during the same years, he feels the same needs,
strives in the same direction, and thus moves along happily
with the multitude which supports him and which is invigor-
ated by him. In this matter we see whole nations and
epochs delighted by their artists, just as the artist sees him-
INTRODUCTION TO PROPYLXEN
^t reflected in his nation and his epoch, without either
liaving even the slightest suspicion that their path might not
be right, that their taste might be at least one-sided, their
art on the decline, and their progress in the wrong direction.
Instead of proceeding to further generalities on this poin^
we shall make a remark which refers particularly to plastic
art
For the German artist, in fact for modem and northern
artists in general, it is difficult — indeed almost impossible — to
make the transition from formless matter to form, and to
maintain himself at that point, even should he succeed in
reaching it. Let every artist who has lived for a time in Italy
ask himself whether the presence of the best works of an-
cient and modern art have not aroused in him the incessant
endeavour to study and imitate the human figure in its pro-
portions, forms, and characteristics, to apply all diligence
and care in the execution in order to approach those artistic
works, so entirely complete in themselves, in order to pro-
duce a work which, in gratifying the sense, exalts the spirit
to the greatest heights. Let him also admit, however, that
after his return he must gradually relax his efforts, because
he finds few persons who will really see, enjoy, and com-
prehend what is depicted; but, for the most part, finds only
those who look at a work superficially, receive from it mere
random impressions, and in some way of their own try to
get out of it any kind of sensation and pleasure.
The worst picture can appeal to our senses and imagination
by arousing their activity, setting them free, and leaving
them to themselves; the best work of art also appeals to
our senses, but in a higher language which, of course, we
must understand; it enchains the feelings and imagination;
it deprives us of caprice, we cannot deal with a perfect work
at our will ; we are forced to give ourselves up to it. in order
to receive ourselves from it again, exalted and refined.
That these are no dreams we shall try to show gradually,
in detail, and as clearly as possible; we shall call attention
particularly lo a contradiction in which the moderns are
often involved. They call the ancients their teachers, they
acknowledge in their works an unattainable excellence, yet
y depart both in theory and practice far from the i
M oocms
which tbe andents continuaUy observed. In starliiigr from
this important point and in returning to it often, we fhatl
find otliers about which something falls to be said.
One of the principal signs of the decay of art is the mix-
ture of its various kinds. The arts themselves, as well as
their branches, are related to one another, and have a cer-
tain tendency to unite, even to lose themselves in one an-
other ; but it is in this that the duty, the merit, the dignity of
the real artist consists, namely, in being able to separate Hie
field of art in which he works from others, in placing every
art and every branch of art on its own footing, and in isolat-
ing it as far as possible.
It has been noticed that all plastic art strives toward
painting, all literary art toward the drama, and this observa-
tion may in the future give us occasion for important reflec-
tions.
The genuine law-giving artist strives for the truth of art,
the lawless artist who follows a blind impulse strives for
the reality of Nature; through the former, art reaches its
highest summit, through the latter its lowest stage.
What holds good of art in general holds good also of the
kinds of art. The sculptor must think and feel differently
from the painter, indeed he must proceed when he wishes
to produce a work in relief, in a different fashion from that
which he will employ for a work in the round. By the raising
of low reliefs higher and higher, by the making of various
parts and figures stand out completely, and finally by the
adding of buildings and landscapes, so that work was pro-
duced which was half painting and half puppet-show, true
art steadily declined. Excellent artists of modern times have
tin fortunately pursued this course.
When in the future we express such maxims as we think
sound, we should like, since they are deduced from works o£
art, to have them put to the test of practice by the artist.
How rarely one can come to a theoretical agreement vrith
anyone else on a fundamental principle. That which is ap-
plicable and useful, on the other hand, is decided upon much
more quickly. How often we see artists in embarrassment
over the choice of subjects, over the general type of composi-
tioD adapted to their art, and the dcUilcd arrangement; how
INTRODUCTION TO PHOPYI.AEN
27S
! the painter over tlie choice of colors! Then Is the
test a principle, then will it be easier to decide
whether it is bringing us closer to the great models and to
everything that we value and love in them, or whether it
leaves us entangled in the empirical confusion of an experi-
ence that has not been sufficiently thought out.
If such maxims hold good in training the artist, in guiding
him in many an embarrassment, they will serve also in the de-
velopment, valuation, and judgment of old and new works
of art, and will in turn arise from an observation of these
Works, Indeed, it is a!l the more necessary to adhere to
this, because, notwithstanding the universally praised excel-
lences of antiquity, individuals and whole nations among
the moderns often fail to recognize wherein hes the highest
excellence of those works.
An exact test will protect us best from this evil. For
that reason let us cite only one example to show what
usually happens to the amateur in plastic art, so that we may
make clear how necessary it is that criticism of ancient as
well as modern works should be exact if it is to be of any
use.
Upon him who has an eye for beauty, though untrained,
even a blurred, imperfect plaster cast of an excellent an-
tique will always have a great effect; for in such a repro-
duction there always remain the idea, the simplicity and
greatness of form, in short, the general outlines; as much,
at all events, as one could perceive with poor eyes at a
distance.
It may be noticed that a strong inclination toward art is
often enkindled hy such quite imperfect reproductions. But
the effect is like the object; it is rather that an obscure in-
definite feeling is aroused, than that the object in al! its
worth and dignity really appears to such beginners in art.
These are they who usually express the theory that too
minute a critical investigation destroys the enjoyment, who
are accustomed to oppose and resist regard for details.
If gradually, however, after further experience and train-
ing, they are confronted with a sharp cast instead of a
blurred one, an original instead of a cast, their pleasure
grows with their insigbt, and increases when the originals
themselves, the perfect originals, finally become known to
them.
The labyrinth of exact observations is willingly entered
when the details as well as the whole are perfect; indeed
one learns to realize that the excellences can be appreciated
only in proportion as the defects arc perceived. To dis-
criminate the restoration from the genuine parts, and the
copy from the original, to see in the smallest fragments the
mined glory of the whole — this is the joy of the finished
expert; and there is a great difference between observing
and comprehending an imperfect whole with obscured
vision, and a perfect whole with clear vision.
He who concerns himself with any branch of knowledge,
should strive for the highest! Insight is different from
practice, for in practical work everyone must soon resign
himself to the fact that only a certain measure of strength
is alloted to him; far more people, however, are capable
of knowledge and insight. Indeed, one may well say that
everyone is thus capable who can deny himself and subordi-
nate himself to external objects, everj-one who does not
strive with rigid and narrow-minded obstinacy to impose
upon the highest works of Nature and Art his own person-
ality and his petty onesideness.
To speak of works of art fitly and with true benefit to
oneself and others, the discussion should take place only in
the presence of the works themselves. Everything depends
on the objects being in view; on whether something abso-
lutely definite is suggested by the word with which one
hopes to illuminate the work of art; for, otherwise, nothing
is thought of at all. This is why it so often happens that the
writer on art dwells merely on generalities, through which,
indeed, ideas and sensations are aroused in all readers, but
no satisfaction is given to the man who, book in hand.
Steps in front of the work of art itself. Precisely on this
account, however, we may in several essays be in a position
to arouse rather than to satisfy the desire of the readers;
for nothing is more natural than that they should wish to
have before their eyes immediately an excellent work of art
which is minutely dissected, in order to enjoy the whole
which we are discussing, and, so far as the parts are con-
cerned, to subject to their own judgment the opinion which
they read.
While the authors, however, write on the assumption that
their readers either have seen the works, or will see them in
the future, yet they hope to do everything in their power for
those who are in neither case. We shall mention reproduc-
tions, shall indicate where casts of antique works of art and
antique works themselves are accessible, particularly to
Germans; and thus try. as far as we can, to minister to the
genuine love and knowledge of art.
A history of art can be based only upon the highest and
most detailed comprehension of art ; only when one knows the
finest things that man can produce can one trace the
psychological and chronological course taken in art, as in
other fields. This course began with a limited activity,
busied about a dry and even gloomy imitation of the in-
Bignificant as well as the significant, whence developed a
more amiable, more kindly feeling toward Nature, till finally,
tinder favorable circumstances, accompanied by knowledge,
regularity, seriousness, and severity, art rose to its height.
There at last it became possible for the fortunate genius,
surrounded by all these auxiliaries, to produce the charming
and the complete.
Unfortunately, however, works of art with such ease of
expression, which instil into man cheerfulness, freedom, and
a pleasant feeling of his own personality, arouse in the
striving artist the idea that the process of production is also
agreeable. Since the pinnacle of what art and genius pro-
duce is an appearance of ease, the artists who come after
are tempted to make things easy for themselves, and to work
{or the sake of appearances. Thus art gradually declines
from its high position, as to the whole as well as details.
But if we wish to gain a fair conception, we must come
down to details of details, an occupation not always agreeable
or charming, but by and by richly rewarded with a more
certain view of the whole.
If the experience of observing ancient and mediaeval
works of art has shown us that certain maxims hold good
we need these most of all in judging the most recent modern
productions; for, since personal relations, love and hatred of
vn
COBTHE
individuals, favor or disfavor of the multitude so easily
enter into the valuation of living or recently deceased artists,
we are in all the more need of principles in order to pass
judgment on our contemporaries. The inquiry can be con-
ducted in two ways: by diminishing the influence of caprice;
by bringing the question before a higher tribunal. The
principle can be tested as well as its application; and even
if we should not agree, the point in dispute can still be
definitely and clearly pointed out.
Especially should we wish that the vivifying artist, fa
whose works we might perhaps have found something to
remember, might test our judgments carefully in this way;
for everyone who deserves this name is forced in our times
to form, as a result of his work and his rellections, a theory,
or at least a certain conception of theoretical means, by the
use of which he gets along tolerably well in a variety of
cases. It will often be noticed, however, that Jn this way
he sets up as laws such maxims as are in accordance with his
talent, his inclination, and his convenience. He is subject
to a fate that is common to all mankind. How many act in
this very way in other fields! But we are not cultivating
ourselves when we merely set in motion with ease and con-
venience that which lies in us. Every artist, like every man,
is only an individual, and will always lean to one side. For
that reason, man should pursue so far as possible, both theo-
retically and practically, that which is contrary to his nature.
Let the easy-going seek what is serious and severe; let the
stern keep before his eyes the light and agreeable; the
strong, loveliness; the amiable, strength; and everyone will
develop his own nature the more, the farther he seems to
femove himself from it. Every art requires the whole man;
the highest possible degree of art requires all mankind.
The practice of the plastic arts is mechanical, and the
training of the artist rightly begins in his earliest youth
with the mechanical side; the rest of his education, on the
other hand, is often neglected, for it ought to be far more
careful than the training of others who have opportunity
of deriving advantage from life itself. Society soon makes
a rough person courteous, a business life makes the most
•imple persoa prudent; literary labors, which through pride
INTRODUCTION TO PROPYLSEN
me before a great public, find opposition and correction
"ererywhere i only the plastic artist is, for the most part,
limited to a lonely workshop; he has dealings almost solely
with the man who orders and pays for his labor, with a puV
lic which frequently follows only certain morbid impres-
sions, with connoisseurs who make him restless, with auc-
tioneers who receive every new work with praise and esti-
mates of value such as would fitly honor the most super-
lative production.
But it is time to conclude this introduction lest it antici-
pate and forestall the work, instead of merely preceding it.
We have so far at least designated the point from which we
intend to set out; how far our views can and will spread,
must at first develop gradually. The theory and criticism
of literary art will, we hope, soon occupy us; and whatever
life, travel, and daily events suggest to us, shall not be ex-
cluded. In closing, let us say a word on an important con-
cern of this moment.
For the training of the artist, for the enjoyment of the
friend of art, it was from time immemorial of the greatest
significance in what place the works of art happened to be.
There was a time when, except for slight changes of loca-
tion, they remained for the most part in one place; now,
however, a great change has occurred, which will have im-
portant consequences for art in general and in particular.
At present we have perhaps more cause than ever to regard
Italy as a great storehouse of art — as it still was until re-
cently. When it is possible to give a general review of it,
then it will be shown what the world lost at the moment
when so many parts were torn from this great and ancient
What was destroyed in the very act of tearing away will
probably remain a secret forever; but a description of the
new storehouse that is being formed in Paris will be possible
in a few years. Then the method by which an artist and a
lover of art is to use France and Italy can he indicated;
and a further important and fine question will arise: what
are other nations, particularly Germany and England, to
do in this period of scattering and loss, to make generally
useful the manifold and widely strevra treasures of art— «
280 GOETHE
task requiring the true cosmopolitan mind which is found
perhaps nowhere purer than in the arts and sciences? And
what are they to do to help to form an ideal storehouse,
which in the course of time may perhaps happily compensate
us for what the present moment tears away when it does not
destroy?
So much in general of the purpose of a work in which we
desire manjr earnest and friendly symgathizers.
PREFACES TO VARIOUS
VOLUMES OF POEMS
BY WILUAM WORDSWORTH'
ADVERTISEMENT
TO LYRICAL BALLADS
(1798)
IT is the honourable characteristic of Poetry that its
materials are to be found in every subject which can
interest the human mind. The evidence of this fact
is to be sought, not in the writings of Critics, but in those
of Poets themselves.
The majority of the following poems are to be considered
as experiments. They were writjen chiefly with a view to
ascertain how farthe language of conversation in" the ihlSdle
andTower classes of society is adapted to the purposes of
poetic pleasure, Readers accustomed to the gaudine'ss aiiS
inane phraseology of many modem writers, if they persist
in reading this book to its conclusion, will perhaps frequently
have to struggle with feelings of strangeness and awkward-
ness: they will look round for poetry, and will be induced
to inquire by what species of courtesy these attempts can be
permitted to assume that title. It is desirable that such read-
ers, for their own sakes, should not suffer the solitary word
Poetry, a word of very disputed meaning, to stand in the way
of their gratification; but that, while they are perusing this
book, they should ask themselves if it contains a natural
delineation of human passions, human characters, and
human incidents; and if the answer be favourable to the
author's wishes, that they should consent to be pleased in
igland, was aJw
: Pre/ac« -nd
eightceatb ceoLuiyi and cgQiain bcudei
on the nature of poetiy id be found ii
" Ciomwell," to be found later in the vo
BK WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
pcpite of that most dreadful enemy to our pleasures, our own
F pre-established codes of decision.
I Readers of superior judgement may disapprove of the
I style in which many of these pieces are executed; it must
be expected that many lines and phrases will not exactly
suit their taste. It will perliaps appear to them, that wish-
ing to avoid the prevalent fault of the day, the author has
sometimes descended too low, and that many of his expres-
sions are too familiar, and not of sufficient dignity. It is
apprehended that the more conversant the reader is with our
elder writers, and with those in modem times who have been
the most successful in painting manners and passions, the
fewer complaints of this kind will he have to make.
An accurate taste in poetry, and in all the other arts, Sif
Joshua Reynolds has observed, is an acquired talent, which
can only be produced by severe thought, and a long continued
intercourse with the best models of composition. This u
mentioned not with so ridiculous a purpose as to prevent the
most inexperienced reader from judging for himself; but
merely to temper the rashness of decision, and to suggest
that if poetry be a subject on which much time has not b«en
bestowed, the judgement may be erroneous, and that in
many cases it necessarily will be so.
The tale of Goody Blake and Harry GUI is founded on a
wdl-authenticaled fact which happened in Warwickshire.
Of the other poems in the collection, it may be proper to
say that they are either absolute inventions of the author, or
facts which took place within his personal observation or
that of his friends. The poem of The Thorn, as the reader
will soon discover, is not supposed to be spoken in the
author's own person; the character of the loquacious nar-
rator will sufficiently show itself in the course of the story.
The Rime of the AncyetK Marinere was professedly written
in imitation of the style, as well as of the spirit of the elder
poets ; but with a few exceptions, the Author believes that
the language adopted in it has been equally intelligible for
these three last centuries. The lines entitled Expostulation
and Reply, and those which follow, arose out of conversa-
tion with a friend who was somewhat unreasonably attached
to modem books of moral philosophy.
PREFACE TO LYRICAL BALLADS
(1800)
THE first volume of these Poems has already been sub-
mitted to general perusal. It was published, as an ex-
periment, which, I hoped, might be of some use to
ascertain, how far, by fitting to metrical arrangement a selec- 1
tion of the real language of men in a state of vivid sensation, I
that sort of pleasure and that quantity of pleasure may be
imparted, which a Poet may rationally endeavour to impart,
I had formed no very inaccurate estimate of the probable
effect of those Poems: I flattered myself that Ihey who
should be pleased with them would read them with more
than common pleasure: and, on the other hand, I waa
well aware, that by those who should dislike them, they
would be read with more than common dislike. The result
baa differed from my expectation in this only, that a greater
number have been pleased than I ventured to hope I should
please.
Several of my Friends are anxious for the success qf
these Poems, from a belief, that, if the views with which
they were composed were indeed realized, a class of Poetry
would be produced, well adapted to interest mankind per-
manently, and not unimportant in the quality, and in the
multiplicity of its moral relations: and on this account they
have advised me to prefix a systematic defence of the theory
upon which the Poems were written. But I was unwilling to
undertake the task, knowing that on this occasion the
Reader would look coldly upon my arguments, since I might
be suspected of having been principally influenced by the
selfish and foolish hope of reasoning him into an approba-
tion of these particular Poems : and I was still more unwill-
Jag to undertake the task, because, adequately to display the
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
- opiniaiu, and fnllr to enforce the argBmetiU, would require
B iriaoUy dtsproportiooate to a preface. For. to treat
die sabject with the clearness and ctdterencc of which it is
mscepitible, it would be necessarj to give a full account of
tbe present sate of the pnbUc taste in this country, and to
deteRDtne bow Hr this taste is healthy or depraved ; which,
again, coold not be detcrtnincd, witiioat pomting; out in
what manner language and the human miad act and re-act
oo each otbcr. and witbout retracing the reroIutMos, not
of lilermtnte atone, bat likewise of socie^ itself. I faave
ttwrefore altogether declined to enter regnJariy upon this
defence ; yet I am sensible, that there would be somethii^
Kke improprien- in abruptly obtruding iqioo the Public, with-
out a few words of introdnctioa. Poems so materially dif-
lemtt from those upon which gesKial approbation is at
It is sopposed. that bj the act of writii^ in verse an
Aodtor mika a formal engsgoiMBl that he wtO gratify cer-
tain known habits of associatioa; that be not only thus ap-
prises the Reader that certain classes of ideas and expres-
aoos win be found in his bocdc, bvt dot others wiD be care-
fully exchaded. This expooent or symbol bek] f onfa bg
metrical language must in Afferent etas of "
excited very different ^^l'^' laticw^* for cxaa
of CatuUns, Terence, and Locretius, and that of
Oawfian; and in oor own country, in the age
i pea re and Deaumoot and Fietctier. and that of
Cowley, or t>t7dai. or Pope. I wiD not take
determine the exact tnpon of the promise
act of wrilii^ in verse, an Antbor in ti«e pn a at
to hb reader : Utt it will uodoafacedly appear U
&at I have not fulfilled the tenns of an cb)
vofamtarily contracted. They who have been
the gan£ness and inane phraseology of mi
writers, if they persist ia tea£i^ this book
elusion, win, no doubt, frequently have to sUagck.
higs of strangeness and awkardness: tbef vfl '
for poetry, and will be indueed to iofaiiw hf
of courtesy these attempts can be p^muffed IB
tkk. I hope tfacrelore the reader wiQ Mt
TO LTKICAL BAZXADS (1900) 28S
attempting to state what I have proposed to myself to per-
form; and also (as far as the limits of a preface will per-
mit) to explain some of the chief reasons which have deter-
mined me in the choice of my purpose: that at least he may
be spared any unpleasant feeling of disappointment, and that
I myself may be protected from one of the most dis-
honourable accusations which can be brought against an
Author; namely, that of an indolence which prevents him
from endeavouring to ascertain what is his duty, or, when
his duty is ascertained, prevents him from performing it.
The principal object, then, proposed in these Poems was
to choose incidents and situations from common life, and
to relate or describe them, throughout, as far as was possible
in a selection of language really used by men, and, at the
same time, to throw over them a certain colouring of im-
agination, whereby ordinary things should be presented to
the mind in an unusual aspect; and, further, and above all,
to make these incidents and situations interesting by trac-
ing in them, truly though not ostentatiously, the primary
laws of our nature: chiefly, as far as regards the manner
in which we associate ideas in a state of excitement. Humble
and rustic life was generally chosen, because, in that con- i
dition, the essential passions of the heart find a better soil '
in which they can attain their maturity, are less under
restraint, and speak a plainer and more emphatic language ;
because in that condition of life our elementary feelings
coexist in a state of greater simplicity, and, consequently,
may be more accurately contemplated, and more forcibly
communicated; because the manners of rural life germinate
from those elementary feelings, and, from the necessary
character of rural occupations, are more easily compre-
hended, and are more durable; and, lastly, because in that \
condition the passions of men are incorporated with the '
beautiful and permanent forms of nature. The language, \
too, of these men has been adopted (purified indeed from
what appear to be its real defects, from all lasting and
rational causes of dislike or disgust) because such men
hourly communicate with the best objects from which the
best part of language is originally derived; and because,
from their rank in society and the sameness and narrow
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
circle of their intercourse, being less under the influence of
\ social vanity, they convey their feelings and notions in sim-
*plc and unelabonited expressions. Accordingly, such a
lan^age, arising out of repeated experience and regular
feelings, is a more permanent, and a far more philosophical
language, than that which is frequently substituted for it
by Poets, who think that they are conferring honour upon
thenaselvcs and their art, in proportion as they separate
themselves from the sympathies of men, and indulge in
arbitrary and capricious habits of expression, in order to
furnish food for fickle tastes, and fickle appetites, of their
own creation.'
I cannot, however, be insensible to the present outcry
against the triviality and meanness, both of thought and
language, which some of my contemporaries have occa-
sionally introduced into their metrical compositions; and I
acknowledge that this defect, where it exists, is more dis-
honourable to the Writer's own character than false re-
finement or arbitrary innovation, though I should contend
at the same time, that it is far less pernicious in the sum of
its consequences. From such verses the Poems in these
t. volumes will be found distinguished at least by one mark of
J difference, that each of them has a worthy purpose. Not
that I always began to write with a distinct purpose
formerly conceived; but habits of meditation have, I trust,
so prompted and regulated my feelings, that my descrip-
tions of such objects as strongly excite those feelings, will
be found to carry along with them a purpose. If this
opinion be erroneous, I can have little right to the name at
la Poet. For al! good poetry is tlie spontaneous overflow of
I powerful feelings: and though this be true, Poems to which
1 any value can be attached were never produced on any
variety of subjects but by a man who, being possessed of
more than usual organic sensibility, had also thought long
and deeply. For our continued influxes of feeling are
modified and directed by our thoughts, which are indeed the
representatives of all our past feelings; and. as by contem-
plating the relation of these general representatives to each
'Hi! worlh while here lo observe, that tbs aftteling turti of Chiue.
me ilmojt «lway3 eiprejaed in luiguRge pure and uni»ers»llj iilrUiaib
TO LTHICAI- BALLADS (1900)
287
r, we discover what is really important to men, so, by the
ipetition and continuance of this act, our feelings will be
connected with important subjects, till at length, if we be
originally possessed of much sensibility, such habits of mind
will be produced, that, by obeying blindly and mechanically
the impulses of those habits, we shall describe objects, and
utter sentiments, of such a nature, and in such connexion
with each other, that the understanding of the Reader must
necessarily be in some degree enlightened, and his affections
strengthened and purified.
It has been said that each of these poems has a purpose
Another circumstance must be mentioned which dis-
tinguishes these Poems from the popular Poetry of the day;
it is this, that the feeling therein developed gives importance
to the action and situation, and not the action and situation
to the feeling.
A sense of false modesty shall not prevent me from
asserting, that the Reader's attention is pointed to this
mark of distinction, far less for the sake of these particular
Poems than from the general importance of the subject.
X,h e subject is ind eed importan t! For the human mind is
capable ot bemg excited without the application of gross
and violent stimulants; and he must have a very faint per- '
ception of its beauty and dignity who does not know this,
and who does not further know, that one being is elevated
above another, in proportion as he possesses this capability.
It has therefore appeared to me, that to endeavour to pro-
duce or enlarge this capability is one of the best services in
which, at any jieriod, a Writer can be engaged ; but this
service, excellent at all times, is especially so at the present
day. For a multitude of causes, unknown to former times,
are now acting with a combined force to blunt the dis-
criminating powers of the mind, and, unfitting it for all
voluntary exertion, to reduce it to a state of almost savage
torpor. The most effective of these causes are the great
national events which are daily taking place, and the in-
creasing accumulation of men in cities, where the uniformity
of their occupations produces a craving for extraordinary
incident, which the rapid communication of intelligence
hourly gratifies. To this tendency of life and manners the
WILUAM WORDSWORTH
' literature and theatrical exhibitions of the country have
conformed themselves. The invaluable works of our elder
writers, 1 had almost said the works of Shakespeare and
Milton, are driven into neglect by frantic novels, sickly and
stupid German Tragedies, and deluges of idle and CJttrava-
.gant stories in verse. — When I think upon this degrading
ithirst after outrageous stimulation, I am almost ashamed
Ho have spoken of the feeble endeavour made in tiiese
volumes to counteract it ; and, reflecting upon the magnitude
of the general evil, I should be oppressed with no dis-
honourable melancholy, had I not a deep impression of cer-
tain inherent and indestructible qualities of the human
mind, and likewise of certain powers in the great and per-
manent objects that act upon it, which are equally inherent
and indestructible; and were there not added to this impres-
sion a belief, that the time is approaching when the evil will
be systematically opposed, by men of greater powers, and
with far more distinguished success.
Having dwelt thus long on the subjects and aim of these
Poems, 1 shall request the Reader's permission to apprise
him of a few circumstances relating to their style, in order,
among other reasons, that he may not censure me for not
having performed what I never attempted. The Reader will
ffn't thPt peisonifications of abstract ideas rarely occur in
these volumes; and are utterly rejected, as an ordlhaty ' de-
* vice to elevate the style, and raise it above prose. My pur-
pose was to imitate, and, as far as possible, to adopt the vety
language of men ; and assuredly such personifications do
nol make any natural or regular part of that language.
They are, indeed, a figure of speech occasionally prompted
by passion, and I have made use of them as such; but have
endeavoured utterly to reject them as a mechanical device
of style, or as a family language which Writers in metn
seem to lay claim to by prescription, I have wished to
keep the Reader in the company of flesh and blood, per-
suaded that by so doing I shall interest him. Others who
pursue a different track will interest him likewise; I do not
interfere with their claim, but wish to prefer a claim of
my own. There will also be found in these volumei_little
of what is usually called poetic diction; as much pains^aT
^p TO LYRICAL BALLADS (1900) 289
^mn taken to avoid it as is ordinarily taken to produce it;
mis has been done for the reason already alleged, to bring
my language near to the language of men; and further,
because" tfie pleasure wlircT)~I~tiave proposed to myself to
impart, is of a kind very different from that which is
supposed by many persons to be the proper object of poetry.
Without being culpably particular, I do not know how to
give my Reader a more exact notion of tlie style in which it
was my wish and intention to write, than by informing
him that I have at all times endeavoured to look steadily at
ray subject; consequently, there is I hope in these Poems
little falsehood of description, and my ideas a re express ed
in language fitted -fti their respective inipoffahce. Some-
thing must have been gained by this practice, as it is friendly
to one property of all good poetry, namely, good sense ; but
it has necessarily cut me off from a large portion of phrases
and figures of speech which from father to son have long
been regarded as the common inheritance of Poets. I have
also thought it expedient to restrict myself still further, hav-
ing abstained from the use of many expressions, in them-
selves proper and beautiful, but which have been foolishly
repeated hy bad Poets, til! such feelings of disgust are
connected with them as it is scarcely possible by any art
of association to overpower.
If in a poem there should be found a series of lines, or
even a single line, in which the language, though naturally
arranged, and according to the strict laws of metre, does not
differ from that of prose, there is a numerous class of
critics, who, when they stumble upon these prosaisms, as
they call them, imagine that they have made a notable dis-
covery, and exult over the Poet as over a man ignorant of
his own profession. Now these men would establish a
canon of criticism which the Reader will conclude he must
utterly reject, if he wishes to be pleased with these volumes.
And it would be a most easy task to prove to him, that not
only the language of a large portion of every good poem,
even of ~lhe most elevated character, must necessarily, ex-
cept with reference to the metre, in no respect differ from
that of good prose, but likewise that some of the most in-
terestuig'^afirof the best poems will be found to be strictly
(10) HC— Vol, 39
raeo WILLIAM WOHDSWORTH
F the language of prose when prose is well written. The
truth of this assertion might be demonstrated by innumer-
able passages from almost all the poetical writings, even of
Milton himself. To illustrate the subject in a general m^m-
ner, I will here adduce a short composition of Gray, who
was at the head of those who, by their reasonings, have
attempted to widen the space of separation betwixt Prose
and Metrical composition, and was more than any other
I man curiously elaborate in the structure of his own poetic
■ diction.
H In vain to me the smilinK momiDgs sbinc,
H And reddcnins Pbnbus lifte bis golden fire;
H The birds in vain tbeir amorous descant join,
H Or cheerful fields resume their green atiire.
H These ears, aias I for other notes repine :
H A different ahjtel do these eyes reguire:
H My lonely aHguisk melts ho heart but mine;
H And in my hreasi the imperfect joys expire;
^M Yet morning smiles the busy race to cheer,
H And new-born pleasure brings to happier meni
■ The Gelds to all their wonted tribute bear ;
W To warm their Hltle loves the birds complain.
■ / fruilless mourn to him that cannot hear.
I And tveep the more because I weep in foio.
' It will easily be perceived, that the only part of thi»
Sonnet which is of any value is the lines printed in Italics;
it is equally obvious, that, except in the rhyme, and in
the use of the single word ' fruitless ' for fruitlessly, which
is so far a defect, the language of these lines docs in no
respect differ from that of prose.
By the foregoing quotation it has been shown that the
language of Prose may yet be well adapted to Poetry: and
it was previously asserted, that a large portion of the
language of every good pqem can in no respect differ from
■Sthat of good Prose. We will go further. It may be safely
tefiirmed, that there neither is, nor can be, any essential
difference between the language of prose and metrical com-
position. We are fond of tracing the resemblance between
Poetry and Painting, and, accordingly, we call them Sisters;
but where shall we find bonds of connexion sufficiently strict
to typify the affinity betwixt metrical and prose composition?
They both speak by and to the same organs; the bodies in
TO LYHICAL BALLADS (1600) 291
which both of them arc clothed may be said to be of the
same substance, their affections are kindred, and almost
identical, not necessarily differing even in degree; Poetry"
sheds no tears ' such as Angels weep,' but natural and
human fears; she can boast of no celestial choir that dis>
tinguishes her vital juices from those of prose; the same
human hlood circulates through the veins of them both.
If it be aiErmed that rhyme and metrical arrangement
of themselves constitute a distinclion which overturns what
has just been said on the strict affinity of metrical language
with that of prose, and paves the way for other artificial
distinctions which the mind voluntarily admits, I answer
that the language of such Poetry as is here recommended
is, as far as is possible, a selection of the language really
spoken by men ; that this selection, wherever it is made with
true tasle and feeling, will of itself form a distinction far
greater ^han would at first be imagined, and will entirely-
separate the composition from the vulgarity and meanness of
ordinary life; and, if metre be superadded thereto. 1 believe
that a dissimilitude will be produced altogether sufficient for
the gratification of a rational mind. What other distinction
would we have? Whence is it to come? And where is it
to exist? Not, surely, where the Poet speaks through the
mouths of his characters : it cannot be necessary here, either
for elevation of stj'le, or any of its supposed ornaments:
for, if the Poet's subject be Judiciously chosen, it will
naturally, and upon fit occasion, lead him to passions the
language of which, if selected truly and judiciously, must
necessarily be dignified and variegated, and alive with
metaphors and figures. I forbear to speak of an incongruity
which would shock the intelligent Reader, should the Poet
interweave any foreign splendour of his own with that which
the passion naturally suggests: it is sufficient to say that
such addition is unnecessary. And, surely, it is more
probable that those passages, which with propriety abound
BDt much canfusTon bss bKn introduced into critteisn by Ihis contiadii-
tjnciion of Poetry ind Prose, instead of the more phllosophicil dim of
PoMry and Matter, of_ Fact, or Scieinre. The only iilrirt antltbesis lo Proa=
of melrE so naluralV occur 'in writing piiuc,' tlut it would be scarcely
Did Ihem. eren were it deuribls.
pre WILLIAM WORDSWORTH ■
' with metaphors and figures, will have their due effect, it,
upon other occasions where the passions are of a milder
character, the style also be subdued and temperate.
Bui, as the pleasure which I hope to give by the Poems
now presented to tlie Reader must depend enlireiy on just
notions upon this subject, and, as it is in itself of high im-
portance to our taste and moral feelings, I cannot content
myself with these detached remarks. And if, in what I am
about to say, it shall appear to some that my labour is
unnecessary, and that I am like a man 6ghling a battle
without enemies, such persons may be reminded, that, what-
ever be the language outwardly holden by men, a practical
faith in the opinions which I am wishing to establish is
almost unknown. If my conclusions are admitted, and
carried as far as they must be carried if admitted at a!!,
our judgements concerning the works of the greatest Poets
both ancient and modem will be far different from what
they are at present, both when we praise, and when we
censure: and our moral feelings influencing and influenced
by these judgements will, I believe, be corrected and
purified.
Taking up the subject, then, upon general grounds, let
me ask, what is meant by the word Poet? What is a Poet?
To whom does he address himself? And what language
is to be expected from him? — He is a man speaking to men:
a man, it is true, endowed with more lively sensibility, more
enthusiasm and tenderness, who has a greater knowledge
of human nature, and a more comprehensive soul, than are
supposed to be common among mankind; a man pleased
with his own passions and volilions, and who rejoices more
than other men in the spirit of hfe that is in him; delight-
ing to contemplate similar volitions and passions as mani-
fested in the goings-on of the Universe, and habitually
impelled to create them where he does not find them. To
these qualities he has added a disposition to be affected more
than other men by absent things as if they were present;
an ability of conjuring up in himself passions, which are
indeed far from being the same as those produced by real
events, yet (especially in those parts of the general sympathy
which are pleasing and delightful) do more nearly resemUe
^M TO LYRICAL BALLADS (ISOO) 293
P!tte passions produced by real events, than anything which,
from the motions of their own minds merely, other men are
accustomed to feel in themselves; — whence, and from
practice, he has acquired a greater readiness and power in
expressing what He thinks and feels, and especially those
thoughts and feelings which, by his own choice, or from the
structure of his own mind, arise in him without immediate
external excitement.
But whatever portion of this faculty we may suppose even
the greatest Poet to possess, there cannot be a doubt that
the language which it will suggest to him, must often, in
liveliness and truth, fall short of that which is uttered by
men in real life, under the actual pressure of those passions,
certain shadows of which the Poet thus produces, or feels
to be produced, in himself.
However exalted a notion we would wish to cherish of
the character of a Poet, it is obvious, that while he describes /
and imitates passions, his employment is in some degree!
mechanical, compared with the freedom and power of real (
and substantial action and suffering. So that it will be
the wish of the Poet to bring hts feelings near to those of
tlie persons whose feelings he describes, nay, for short
spaces of lime, perhaps, to let himself slip into an entire
delusion, and even confound and identify his own feel-
ings with theirs; modifying only the language which is
thus suggested to him by a consideration that he describes
for a particular purpose, that of giving pleasure, . Here,/
then, he will apply the principle of selection which has beeni
already insisted upon. He will depend upon this for remov-'
ing what would otherwise be painful or disgusting in the
passion; he will feel that there is no necessity to trick out
or to elevate nature : and, the more indnstrionsly he applies
this principle, the deeper will be his faith that no words,
which his fancy or imagination can suggest, will be to be
compared with those which are the emanations of reality
and truth.
But it may be said by those who do not object to the
genera! spirit of these remarks, that, as it is impossible for
the Poet to produce upon all occasioos language as ex-
^^ffiiisitely fitted for the passion as that whicb the real pas-
^
WILLIAM WOBDSWOaXH
itself st^gests, it is proper that he should consider hla»
self as in the situation of a translator, who does not scruple
to substitute exceilcncies of another kind for those which
are unattainable by him; and endeavours occasionally to sur-
pass his original, in order to make some amends for the
general inferiority to which he feels that he must submit.
But this would be to encourage idleness and unmanly despair.
Further, it is the language of men who speak of what they
do not imderstand; who talk of Poetry as of a matter of
amusement and idle pleasure; who will converse with us
as gravely about a taste for Poetry, as they express it. as
if it were a thing as indifferent as a taste for rope-dancing,
or Frontiniac or Sherry. Aristotle, I have been told, has
said, that Poetry is the most philosophic of all writing: it
is so : its object is truth, not individual and local, but general,
and operative; not standing upon external testimony, but
carried alive into the heart by passion; truth which is its
own testimony, which gives competence and confidence to
the tribunal to which it appeals, and receives them from the
same tribunal Foetrjt-ia— tbcj mage of tpan and nature.
The obstacles wh^clTstand in theway ^ the bdeiity ol me'
Biographer and Historian, and of their consequent utility,
are incalculably greater than those which are to be en-
countered by the Poet who comprehends the dignity of his
art. The Poet writes under one restriction only, namely,
I the necessity of giving immediate pleasure to a human
I Being possessed of that information which may be expected
from him, not as a lawyer, a physician, a mariner, an astron-
omer, or a natural philosopher, but as a Man. Except thia
one restriction, there is no object standing between the
Poet and the image of things; between this, and the
Biographer and Historian, tliere are a thousand.
Nor let this necessity of producing immediate pleasure
be considered as a degradation of the Poet's art It is far
otherwise. It is an acknowledgement of the beauty of the
universe, an acknowledgement die more sincere, because not
formal, but indirect: it is a task light and easy to him who
looks at the world in the spirit of love: further, it is a
homage paid to the native and naked dignity of man, to the
grand elementary principle of pleasure, by which be know&
TO LYRICAL BALLADS (1800)
and feels, and lives, and moves. We Iiave no sympathy
but what is propagated by pleasure: I would not be mis-
understood; but wherever we sympathize with pain, it will
be found that the sympatliy is produced and carried on by
subtle combinations with pleasure. We have no knowledge,
tliat is, no general principles drawn from the contemplation
of particular facts, but what has been built up by pleasu
and exists in us by pleasure alone. The Man of science, the
Chemist and Mathematician, whatever difficulties and dis-
gusts they may have had to struggle with, know and feel
this. However painful may be the objects with which the
Anatomist's knowledge is connected, he feels that his knowl-
edge is pleasure; and where he has no pleasure he has no
knowledge. What then does the Poet? He considers man
and the objects that surround him as acting and re-acting
upon each other, so as to produce an infinite complexity of
pain and pleasure ; he considers man in his own nature and
in his ordinary life as contemplating this with a certain
quantity of immediate knowledge, with certain convictions,
intuitions, and deductions, which from habit acquire the
quality of intuitions; he considers him as looking upon
this complex scene of ideas and sensations, and finding
everywhere objects that immediately excite in him sjTn-
pathies which, from the necessities of his nature, are accom-
panied by an overbalance of enjoyment.
To this knowledge which all men carry about with them,
and to these sympathies in which, without any other disci-
pline than that of our daily life, we are fitted to take delight,
the Poet principally directs his attention. He considers man!
and nature as essentially adapted to each olher, and the!
mind of man as naturally the mirror of the fairest and most \
interesting properties of nature. And thus the Poet, I
prompted by this feeling of pleasure, which accompanies him I
through the whole course o£ his studies, converses with gen- '
era] nature, with affections akin to those, which, through
labour and length of time, the Man of science has raised up
in himself, by conversing with those particular parts of
nature which are the objects of his studies. The knowledge
both of the Poet and the Man of science is pleasure ; but the
JcDOwtedge of the one cleaves to us as a necessary pa,rt of
SBS VTLLIAM WORDSWOBTH
our existence, our natural and unalienable inheritance; the
other is a personal and individual acquisition, slow to come
to us, and by no habitual and direct sympathy connecting us
with our fellow-beings. The Man of science seeks truth as
a remote and unknown benefactor; be cherishes and loves it
in his solitude: the Foet, singing a song in which all human
beings join with him, rejoices in the presence of truth as our
visible friend and hourly companion. Poetry is the breath
and finer spirit of ail knowledge; it is the impassioned ex-
pression which is in the countenance of all Science. Era-
Jphafically may it be said of the Poet, as Shakespeare hath
said of man, 'that he looks before and after.' He is the
rock of defence for human nature: an upholder and pre-
server, carrying everywhere with him relationship and love.
In spite of difference of soil and climate, of language and
manners, of laws and customs: in spite of things silently
gone out of mind, and things violently destroyed; the Poet
binds together by passion and knowledge the vast empire of
human society, as it is spread over the whole earth, and over
all lime. The objects of the Poet's thoughts are everywhere;
though the eyes and senses of man are, it is true, his favour-
ite guides, yet he will follow wheresoever he can find an
atmosphere of sensation in which to move his wings. Poetry
is the first and last of all knowledge — it is as immortal as
the heart of man. If the labours of Men of science should
ever create any material revolution, direct or indirect, in our
condition, and in the impressions which we habitually re-
ceive, the Poet will sleep then no more than at present; he
will be ready to follow the steps of the Man of science, not
only in those general indirect effects, but he will be at his
side, carrying sensation into the midst of the objects of the
science itself. The remotest discoveries of the Chemist, the
Botanist, or Mineralogist, will be as proper objects of the
Poet's art as any upon which it can be employed, if the time
should ever come when these things shall be familiar to us,
and the relations under which they are contemplated by the
followers of these respective sciences shall be manifestly and
palpably material to us as enjoying and suffering beings. If
the time should ever come when wliat is now called science,
thus familiarized to men, shall be ready to put on, as it
were, a form of flesh and blood, the Poet wlil lend his
divine spirit to aid the transfiguration, and will welcome the
Being thus produced, as a dear and genuine inmate of the
household of man. — It is not, then, to be supposed that any
one, who holds that sublime notion of Poetry which I have
attempted to convey, will break in upon the sanctity and
truth of his pictures by transitory and accidental ornaments,
and endeavour to excite admiration of himself by arts, the
necessity of which must manifestly depend upon the assumed
meanness of his subject.
What has been thus far said applies to Poetry in general;
but especially to those parts of composition where the Poet
speaks through the mouths of his characters ; and upon this
point it appears to authorize the conclusion that there are
few persons of good sense, who would not allow that the
dramatic parts of composition are defective, in proportion!
as they deviate from the real language of nature, and are I
colqwred by a diction of the Poet's own, either peculiar to \
him as an individual Poet or belonging simply to Poets in
general ; to a body of men who, from the circumstance of
their compositions being in metre, it is expected will employ
a particular language.
It is not, then, in the dramatic parts of composition that
we look for this distinction of language; but still it may be
proper and necessary where the Poet speaks to us in his own
person and character. To this I answer by referring the
Reader to the description before given of a Poet. Among
the qualities there enumerated as principally conducing to
form a Poet, is implied nothing differing in kind from other
men, but only in degree. The sum of what was said is, that
the Poet is chiefly distinguished from other men by a greater
promptness to think and feel without immediate external
excitement, and a greater power in expressing such thought!
and feelings as are produced in him in that manner. "
these passions and thoughts and feelings are the general
passions and thoughts and feelings of men. And with what
are they connected? Undoubtedly with our moral sentiments
and animal sensations, and with the causes which excite
these; with the operations of the elements, and the appear-
i of the visible universe^ with storm and sunshine.
w
^^V with tfae
WILLIAM wcmuswumu
/
with tfae mohnions of the seasons, wtdi coM and heat,
with lou of friends and kindred, with injuries and resent'
ments, gratttnde and hope, witli fear and sorrow. These,
and the like, are the sensations and objects which the
Poet describes, as thef are the sensations of other men,
and the objects which interest them. The Poet thinks
and feets in the spirit of baman passions. How, then, can
his language differ in anjr materiai degree from that of all
Other men who feel viridly and see dearly? It i " '
proved that it is impossible. Bat supposing that I
not the case, the Poet mi^t then be allowed to use a
language when expressing his feelings for his o ___^^^
cation, or that of men like himself. But Poets do not write
for Poets alone, but for men. Unless therefore we are advo-
cates for that admiration which subsists upon ignorance, and
that pleasure which arises from hearing n*bat we do not un-
derstand, the Poet most descend from this supposed height;
and, in order to excite rational sympathy, be must express
himself as other men express themselves. To this it may
be added, that while he b only selecting from the real lan-
guage of men, or, which amounts to the same thing, com-
posing accurately in the spirit of such selection, be is tread-
ing upon safe ground, and we know what we are to expect
from him. Our feelings are the same with respect to metre;
for, as it may be proper to remind the Reader, the distinction
of metre is regular and uniform, and not, like that whicli is
produced by what is usually called poinc dictiox, arbitrary.
and subject to infinite caprices upon which no calculalioD
whatever can be made. In the one case, the Reader is ut-
terly at the mercy of the Poet, respecting what imagery or
diction he may choose to connect with the passion ; whereas,
in the other, the metre obeys certain laws, to which the Poet
and Reader both willingly submit because they are eerlain,
and because no interference is made by them with the pas-
sion, but such as the concurring testimony of ages has shown
to heighten and improve the pleasure which co-exists with it.
It will now be proper to answer an obvious question,
namely. Why, professing these opinions, have I written in
verse? To this, in addition to such answer as is included in
what has been already said, I reply, in the first place. Because
vividly described in prose, why .
aticmpting to superadd to sudl \
, by the consent of all nations, \
in metrical language? To \
ivinced, it may be answered that
TO LYRICAL BALLADS (1900) 209
however I may have restricted myself, there is still left open
to me what confessedly constitutes the most valuable object
of all writing, whether in prose or verse; the great and uni-
versal passions of men, the most general and interesting of
their occupations, and the entire world of nature before me —
to supply endless combinationa of forms and imagery.
Now, supposing for a moment that whatever is interesting
in these objects may be as vividly described in prose, why i
should I be condemned for attcmpti
description the charm which,
is acknowledged to exist
this, hy such as arc yet unconvinced, it may be answered that
a very small part of the pleasure given by Poetry depends
upon the metre, and that it is injudicious to write in metre,
unless it be accompanied with the other artificial distinctions
of style with which metre is usually accompanied, and that,
by such deviation, more will be lost from the shock which
will thereby be given to the Reader's associations than will
be counterbalanced by any pleasure which he can derive
from the general power of numbers. In answer to those
who still contend for the necessity of accompanying metre
with certain appropriate colours of style in order to the ac-
complishment of its appropriate end, and who also, in my
opinion, greatly underrate the power of metre in itself, it
might, perhaps, as far as relates to these Volumes, have been
almost sufficient to observe, that poems are extant, written
upon more humble subjects, and in a still more naked and
simple style, which have continued to give pleasure from
generation to generation. Now, if nakedness and simplicity
be a defect, the fact here mentioned affords a strong pre-
sumption that poems somewhat less naked and simple are
capable of affording pleasure at the present day; and, what
I wish chie/ly to attempt, at present, was to justify my-
Belf for having written under the impression of this belief.
But various causes might be pointed out why, when the
style is manly, and the subject of some importance, words
metrically arranged will long continue to impart such a
pleasure to mankind as he who proves the extent of that
pleasure will be desirous to impart. The end of Poetry is
to produce excitement in co-«xi5tence with an overbalance
I »w i"
»
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
\ of pleasure ; but, by the suppositioD, excttemeot Is an n
'and irregular state of the mind: ideas and feelings do not; ]
in that state, succeed each other in accustomed order. If '
die words, however, by which this excitement is produced
be in themselves powerful, or the images and feelings have
an undue proportion of pain connected with them, there ii
some danger that the excitement may be carried beyond its
proper bounds. Now the co-presence of something regular,
something to which the mind has been accustomed in various
moods and in a less excited state, cannot but have great ef-
ficacy in tempering and restraining the passion by an inter-
ttxture of ordinary feeling, and of feeling not slrictly and
necessarily connected with the passion. This is unquestion-
ably true ; and hence, though the opinion wDl at first appear
paradoxical, from the tendency of metre to divest language,
in a certain degree, of its reality, and thus to throw a sort of
half-cansciousness of unsubstantial existence over the whole
composition, there can be little doubt but that more pathetic
situations and sentiments, that is, those which have a greater
IpToportion of pain connected with them, may be endured in
Imetrical composition, especially in rhyme, than in prose.
The metre of the old ballads is very artless; yet they contain
many passages which would illustrate this opinion; and, I
hope, if the following Poems be attentively perused, similar
instances will be found in them. This opinion may be fur-
ther illustrated by appealing to the Reader's own experience I
of the reluctance with which he comes to the re-perusal of
the distressful parts of Clarissa Harlowe, or The Gamester; \
while Shakespeare's writings, in the most pathetic scenes, i
never act upon us, as pathetic, beyond the bounds of pleasure
— an effect which, in a much greater degree than might at
first be imagined, is to be ascribed to small, but continual and
regular impulses of pleasurable surprise from the metrical
arrangement, — On the other hand (what it must be allowed
will much more frequently happen) if the Poet's words
should be incommensurate with the passion, and inadequate
to raise the Reader to a height of desirable excitement, then
(unless the Poet's choice of his metre has been grossly in-
judicious), in the feelings of pleasure which the Reader has
been accustomed to connect with metre in general, and in the
TO tVniCAL BALLADS (IBOO)
feeling, whether cheerful or melancholy, which he has been
accustomed to connect with that particular movement of
metre, there will be found something which will greatly con-
tribute to impart passion to the words, and to effect the com-
plex end which the Poet proposes to himself.
If I had undertaken a systematic defence of the theory
here maintained, it would have been my duty to develop the
various causes upon which the pleasure received from met-
rical language depends. Among the chief of these causes is
to be reckoned a principle which must be well known to those
who have made any of the Arts the object of accurate re- t
flection; namely, the pleasure which the mind derives from I
the perception of similitude in dissimilitude. This principle
is the great spring of the activity of oar minds, and their
chief feeder. From this principle the direction of the sexual
appetite, and all the passions connected with tt, take their
origin: it is the life of our ordinary conversation; and upon
the accuracy with which similitude in dissimilitude, and dis-
similitude in similitude are perceived, depend our taste and
our moral feelings. It would not be a useless employment
to apply this principle to the consideration of metre, and to
show that metre is hence enabled to afford much pleasure,
and to point out in what manner that pleasure is produced.
But my limits will not permit me to enter upon this subject,
and I must content myself with a general summary.
I have said that poetry is the spontaneous overflow of
powerful feelings : it takes its origin from emotion recollected
in tranquillity: the emotion is contemplated till, by a species
of reaction, the tranquillity gradually disappears, and an
emotion, kindred to that which was before the subject of
contemplation, is gradually produced, and does itself actually
exist in the mind. In this mocd successful composition gen-
erally begins, and in a mttod similar to this it is carried on;
but die emotion, of whatever kind, and in whatever degree,
from various causes, is qualified by various pleasures, so
that in describing any passions whatsoever, which are volun-j
tarily described, the mind will, upon the whole, be in a statej
of enjoyment. If Nature he thus cautious to preserve in a
state of enjojinent a being so employed, the Poet ought to
^Ofit bjr the lesson held forth to him, and ought especially
WILUAM WORDSWORTH
to take care, that, whatever passions he communicates to his
iReader, those passions, if his Reader's mind be sound aiid
•Hgorous, should always be accompanied with an overbalance
pf pleasure. Now the music of harmonious metrical Ian-
ttiage, the sense of difficulty overcome, and the blind asso-
ciation of pleasure which has been previously received from
works of rhyme or metre of the same or similar construc-
tion, an indistinct perception perpetually renewed of language
closely resembling that of real life, and yet, in the circum-
stance of metre, differing from it so widely — all these imper-
ceptibly make up a complex feeling of delight, which is of
the most important use in lempering the painful feeling
always found intermingled with powerful descriptions of the
deeper passions. This effect is always produced in pathetic
and impassioned poetry; while, in lighter compositions, the
ease and gracefulness with which the Poet manages his
numbers are themselves confessedly a principal source of
the gratification of the Reader. All that it is necessary to
say, however, upon this subject, may be effected by afGrm-
ing. what few persons will deny, that, of two descriptions,
either of passions, manners, or characters, each of them
equally well executed, the one in prose and the other in verse, i
the verse will be read a hundred times where the prose isj
read once.
Having thus explained a few of my reasons for writing In
verse, and why I have chosen subjects from common life,
and endeavoured to bring my language near to the real lan-
guage of men, if I have been too minute in pleading my own
cause, I have at the same time been treating a subject of
general interest; and for this reason a few words shall be
added with reference solely to these particular poems, and
to some defects which will probably be found in them. I
am sensible that my associations ihust have sometimes been
particular instead of general, and that, consequently, giving
to things a false importance. I may have sometimes written
upon unworthy subjects ; but I am less apprehensive on this
account, than that mv language may frequently have suf-
fered from those arbitrary connexions of feelings and ideas
with particular words and phrases, from which no man can
altogether protect himself. Hence I have no doubt, thai, in
TO LYRICAL BALLADS (1800)
some instances, feelings, even of the ludicrous, may be given
to my Readers by expressions which appeared to me tender
and patlietic. Such faulty expressions, were I convinced they
were faulty at present, and that they must necessarily con-
tinue to be so, I would willingly take ail reasonable pains to
correct. But it is dangerous to make these alterations on
the simple authority of a few individuals, or even of certain
classes of men; for where the understanding of an Author
is not convinced, or his feelings altered, this cannot be done
without great injury to himself: for his own feelings are his
stay and support; and, if he set them aside in one instance,
he may be induced to repeat this act till his mind shall lose
all confidence in itself, and become utterly debilitated. To
this it may he added, that the critic ought never to forget
that he is himself exposed to the same errors as the Poet, and,
perhaps, in a much greater degree : for there can be no pre-
sumption in saying of most readers, that tt is not probable
they will be so well acquainted with the various stages of
meaning through which words have passed, or with the
fickleness or stability of the relations of particular ideas
to each other; and, above all, since they are so much
less interested in the subject, they may decide lightly and
carelessly.
Long as the Reader has been detained, I hope he will per-
mit me to caution him against a mode of false criticism
which has been applied to Poetry, in which the language
closely resembles that of life and nature. Such verses have
been triumphed over in parodies, of which Dr. Johnson's
stanza is a fair specimen: —
I put my hat upon my head
And walked into the Strand.
And there I met another man
Whose hat was in his hand.
^immediately under these lines let us place one of the most
Bstly admired stanzas of the 'Babes in the Wood.'
These pretty Babes with band in hand
Went wandering up and down ;
But never more they saw the Man
Approaching from the Town.
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
In both these stanzas the words, and the order of the
words, in no respect differ from the most un impassioned
There are words in both, for example, 'the
Strand,' and 'the Town,' connected with none but the most
famjliar ideas ; yet the one stajiza we admit as admirable, and
the other as a fair example of the superlatively contemptible.
Whence arises this difference? Not from the metre, not
from the language, not from the order of the words; but
the matter expressed in Dr. Johnson's stanza is contempti-
ble. The proper method of treating trivial and simple verses,
to which Dr. Johnson's stanza would be a fair paraUelisnt;
is not to say, this is a bad kind of poetry, or, this ts not
poetry; but, this wants sense; it is neither interesting in
itself nor can lead to anything interesting; the images neither
originate in that sane state of feeling which arises out of
thought, nor can excite thought or feeling in the Reader.
This is the only sensible manner of dealing with such verses-
Why trouble yourself about the species till you have previous-
ly decided upon the genus? Why take pains to prove than
an ape is not a Newton, when it is self-evident that he is
not a man?
One request 1 must make of my reader, which is, that in
judging these Poems he would decide by his own feelings
genuinely, and not by reflection upon what will probably be
the judgement of others. How common is it to hear a per-
son say, I myself do not object to this style of composition,
or this or that expression, but, to such and such classes of
people it will appear mean or ludicrous t This mode of
criticism, so destructive of all sound unadulterated judge-
ment, is almost universal: let the Reader then abide, in-
dependently, by his own feelings, and, if he finds himself
affected, let him not suffer such conjectures to interfere
with his pleasure.
If an Author, by any single composition, has impressed
us with respect for his talents, it is useful to consider this
as affording a presumption, that on other occasions where
we have been displeased, he, nevertheless, may not have
written ill or absurdly; and further, to give him so much
credit for this one composition as may induce us to review
what has displeased us, with more care than we should other-
wise have bestowed upon it. This is not only an act of
justice, but, in our decisions upon poetry especially, may con-
duce, in a higli degree, to the improvement of our own taste;
for an accurate taste in poetry, and in all the other arts, as|
Sir Joshua Reynolds has observed, is an acquired talent,!
which can only be produced by thought and a long continued!
intercourse with the best models of composition. This is
mentioned, not witli so ridiculous a purpose as to prevent the
most inexperienced Reader from judging for himself (I
have already said that I wish him to judge for himself), but
merely to temper the rashness of decision, and to suggest,
that, if Poetry be a subject on which much time has not
been bestowed, the judgement may be erroneous; and that,
in many cases, it necessarily will be so.
Nothing would, I know, have so effectually contributed to
further the end which I have in view, as to have shown of
what kind the pleasure is, and how that pleasure is produced,
which is confessedly produced by metrical composition essen-
tially different from that which I have here endeavoured to
recommend: f o r the^Reader will say that he has ..been
pleased by siicncompositi^; ai5d"WB"at more can be done
for him ? The power of any art iS Hmifed ; arid he will sus-
pecCthat, if it be proposed to furnish him with new friends,
that can be only upon condition of his abandoning his old
friends. Besides, as I have said, the Reader is himself con-
scious of the pleasure which he has received from such com-
position, composition to which he has peculiarly attached the
endearing name of Poetry ; and all men feel an habitual grat-
itude, and something of an honourable bigotry, for the
objects which have long continued to please them: we not
only wish to be pleased, but to be pleased in that particular
way in which we have been accustomed to be pleased. There
is in these feelings enough to resist a host of arguments;
and I should be the less able to combat thera successfully, as
I am willing to allow, that, in order entirely to enjoy the
Poetry which I am, recommending, it would be necessary to
give up much of what is ordinarily enjoyed. But. would my
limits have permitted me to point out how this pleasure is
produced, many obstacles might have been removed, and the
Reader assisted in perceiving that the powers of language
WILLIAM WORDSWOBTH
arc not so limiled as he may suppose ; and that it is possible
for poetry to give other enjoyments, of a purer, more lasting,
and more exquisite nature. This part of the subject has rot
been altogether neglected, but it has not been so much my
present aim to prove, that the interest excited by some other
kinds of poetry is less vivid, and less worthy o£ the nobler
powers of the mind, as to offer reasons for presuming, that
if my purpose were fulfilled, a species of poetry would be
produced, which is genuine poetry ; in its nature well adapted
to interest mankind permanently, and likewise important in
the multiplicity and quality of its moral relations.
From what has been said, and from a perusal of the
Poems, the Reader will be able clearly to perceive the object
which I had in view: he will determine how far it has been
attained; and, what is a much more important question,
whether it be worth attaining: and upon the decision of
these two questions will rest my claim to the approbation o!
the Public
APPENDIX TO LYRICAL BALLADS
(■802)
PERHAPS, as I have no right to expect that attentive
perusal, without which, confined, as I have been, to the
narrow litnits of a preface, my meaning cannot be
tlaoroughly understood, I am anxious to give an exact notion
of the sense in which the phrase poetic diction has been used;
and for this purpose, a few words shall here be added,
concerning the origin and characteristics of the phrase-
ology, which I have condemned under that name.
The earliest poets of all nations generally wrote from
passion excited by real events; they wrote naturally, and
as men: feeling powerfully as they did, their language was
darir.g, and figurative. In succeeding limes, Poets, and Men
ambitious of the fame of Poets, perceiving the influence
of such language, and desirous of producing the same
effect without being animated by the same passion, set
themselves to a mechanical adoption of these figures of
speech, and made use of them, sometimes with propriety,
but much more frequently applied them to feelings and
thoughts with which they had no natural connexion what-
soever, A language was thus insensibly produced, differing
materially from the real language of men in any situation.
The Reader or Hearer of this distorted language found
himself in a perturbed and unusual state of mind: when
affected by the genuine language of passion he had been
in a perturbed and unusual state of mind also: in both
cases he was willing that his common judgement and under-
standing should be laid asleep, and he had no instinctive
and infallible perception of the true to make hjm reject
the false ; the one served as a passport for the other. The
emotion was in both cases delightful, and no wonder if
he confounded the one with the other, and believed them
both to be produced by the same, or similar causes. Be-
Eides, the Poet spake to him in the character of a man to
307
908 WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
be looked up to, a man of genius and authority. Thus, ind
from a variety of other causes, this distorted language
was received with admiration; and Poets, it is probable,
who had before contented themselves for the most part
witli misapplying only expressions which at first had been
dictated by real passion, carried the abuse still further,
and introduced phrases composed apparently in the spirit
of the original figurative language of passion, yet alto-
gether of their own invention, and characterised by various
degrees of wanton deviation from good sense and nature.
It is indeed true, that the language of the earliest Poets
was felt to differ materially from ordinary language, he-
cause it was the language of extraordinary occasions; but
it was really spoken by men, language which the Poet
himself had uttered when he had heen affected by the
events which he described, or which he had heard uttered
by those around him. To this language it is probable that
metre of some sort or other was early superadded. This
separated the genuine language of Poetry still further from
common life, so that whoever read or heard the poems of
these earliest Poets felt himself moved in a way in which
he had not been accustomed to be moved in reij life, and
by causes manifeslly different from those which acted upon
him in real life. This was the great temptation to all the
corruptions which have followed: under the protection of
this feeling succeeding Poets constructed a phraseology
which had one thing, it is true, in common with the genuine
language of poetry, namely, that it was not heard in ordi-
nary conversation; that it was unusual. But the first
Poets, as I have said, spake a language which, though un-
usual, was still the langiiage of men. This circumstance,
however, was disregarded by their successors; they found
that they could please by easier means : they became proud
of modes of expression which they themselves had in-
vented, and which were uttered only by themselves. In
process of time metre became a symbol or promise of this
unusual language, and whoever took upon him to write
in metre, according as he possessed more or less of true
poetic genius, introduced less or more of this adulterated
phraseology into his compositions, and tlie true and the false
APPENDIX TO LYRICAL BALLADS (1809) 309
were inseparately interwoven until, the taste of men be-
coming gradually perverted, this language was received
as a natural language: and at length, by the influence of
books upon men, did to a certain degree really become
so. Abuses oi this kind were imported from one nation
to another, and with tlie progress of refinement this dic-
tion became daily more and more corrupt, thrusting out of
sight the plain humanities of nature by a motley mas-
querade of tricks, quaintnesses, hieroglyphics, and enigmas.
It would not be uninteresting to point out the causes
of the pleasure given by this extravagant and absurd
diction. It depends upon a great variety of causes, but
upon none, perhaps, more than its influence in impressing
a notion of the peculiarity and exaltation of the Poet's
character, and in flattering the Reader's self-love by briug-
ing him nearer to a sympathy with that character ; an effect
which is accomplished hy unsettling ordinary habJIs of
thinking, and thus assisting the Reader to approach to
that perturbed and dizzy state of mind in which if he does
not find himself, he imagines that he is balked of a peculiar
enjoyment which poetry can and ought to bestow.
The sonnet quoted from Gray, in the Preface, except
the lines printed in italics, consists of little else but this dic-
tion, though not of the worst kind; and indeed, if one may
be permitted to say so, it is far too common in the best
writers both ancient and modern. Perhaps in no way,
by positive example could more easily be given a notion
of what I mean by the phrase poetic diction than by re-
ferring to a comparison between the metrical paraphrase
which we have of passages in the Old and New Testament,
and those passages as they exist in our common Trans-
lation. See Pope's Messiah throughout; Prior's ' Did sweeter
sounds adorn my flowing tongue,' &c &c, ' Though I speak
with the tongues of men and of angels,' &c. &c., ist
Corinthians, ch. xiii. By way of immediate example take
the following of Dr. Johnson:
PiCBcribu her duties, or directs her chnice;
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
Yel. timely provident, she baste* away
To snatch the blessings of a plenieous day;
When fruitful Summer loads the teeming plaifl.
She crops the harvest, and she stores the grain.
How long shall sloth usurp thy useless hours,
Unnerve thy vigour, and enchain thy powers?
While artful shades thy downy couch enclose,
And soft solicitation courts repose,
Amidst the drowsy charms of dull delight.
Year chases year with unremitted flight.
Till Want now following, fraudulent and slow.
Shall spring to seize tfaee, like an ambush'd foe.
From this hubbub of words pass to the original. *Go
to the Ant, thou Sluggard, consider her ways, and be wise:
which having no guide, overseer, or ruJer, provideth her
meat in the summer, and gathereth her food in the harvest
How long wilt thou sleep, O Sluggard? when wilt thou
arise out of thy sleep? Yet a little sleep, a little slumber,
a little folding of the hands to sleep. So shall thy pover^
come as one that travelleth, and thy want as an armed
man.' Proverbs, ch. vi.
One more quotation, and I have done. It is from Cow-
per'a .Verses supposed to be written by Alexander Selkirk:
Religion I what treasure untold
Resides in that heavenly word !
More precious thnn silver and gold.
Or all that Ibis earth can afford.
But the sound of the church-going bell
These valleys and rocks never heard.
Ne'er sighed at the sound of a knell.
Or Emiled when a sabbath appeared.
Ye winds, that have made me your sport
Convey to this desolate shore
Some cordial endearing report
Of a land I must visit no morc-
My Friends, do they now and then send
A wish or a thought after me ?
O tetl me T yet have a friend,
Though a friend I am never to see.
This passage is quoted as an instance of three different
Styles of composition. The first four lines are poorly
expressed; some Critics would call the language prosaic;
the fact is, it would be bad prose, so bad, that it is scarcely
APPENDIX TO LYRICAL BALLAD8 (IflOS) SlI
"worse in metre. The epithet ' church -going ' applied to
a bell, and that by so chaste a writer as Cowper, is an in-
stance of the strange abuses which Poets have introduced
into their language, till they and their Readers take them
as matters of course, if they do not single them out ex-
pressly as objects of admiration. The two lines 'Ne'er
sighed at the sound,' &c., are, in my opinion, an instance
of the language of passion wrested from its proper use,
and, from the mere circumstance of the composition being
in metre, applied upon an occasion that does not justify
such violent expressions; and I should condemn the pas-
sage, though perhaps few Readers will agree with me, as
vicious poetic diction. The last stanza is throughout ad-
mirably expressed: it would be equally good whether in
prose or verse, except that the Reader has an exquisite
pleasure in seeing such natural language so naturally con-
nected with metre. The beauty of this stanza tempts me
to conclude with a principle which ought never to be
lost sight of. and which has been my chief guide in all I
have said, — namely, that in worlds of imagination and senti-
ment, for of these only have I been treating, in proportion
as ideas and feelings are valuable, whether the composition
be in prose or in verse, they require and exact one and
the same language. Metre is but adventitious to compo-
sition, and the phraseology for which that passport is neces-
sary, even where it may be graceful at all, will be Utile
valued by the judicious.
THEp
first,
abili
PREFACE TO POEMS
(181S)
i requisite for the produc
1 of poetry a
Kiuction
rvation and Dcscriptio
ability lo observe with accuracy things as they are in
themselves, and with fidelity to describe them, unmodified by
any passion or feeling existing in the raind of the describer;
whether the things depicted be actually present to the senses,
or have a place only in the memory. This power, though
indispensable to a Poet, is one which he employs only in sub-
mission to necessity, and never for a continuance of time:
as its exercise supposes all the higher qualities of the mind
to be passive, and in a slate of subjection to external objects,
much in the same way as a translator or engraver ought to
be to his original, andly. Sensibility, — which, the more
exquisite it is, the wider will be the range of a poet's per-
ceptions; and the more will he be incited to observe objects,
both as they exist in themselves and as re-acted upon by his
own mind. (The distinction between poetic and human sen-
sibility has been marked in the character o£ the Poet de-
lineated in the original preface.) 3rdly, Reflection, — which
makes the Poet acquainted with the value of actions, images,
thoughts, and feelings; and assists the sensibility in per-
ceiving their connexion with each other. 4thly, Imagination
and Fancy, — to modify, to create, and to associate. Sthly,
Invention, — by which characters are composed out of ma-
terials supplied by observation ; whether of the Poet's own
heart and mind, or of external life and nature; and sach
incidents and situations produced as are most impressive to
the imagination, and most fitted to do justice to the charac-
ters, sentiments, and passions, which the Poet undertakes
to illustrate. And. lastly. Judgement, to decide how and
where, and in what degree, each of these faculties ought to
be exerted : so that the less shall not be sacrificed to the
greater; nor the greater, slighting the less, arrogate, to its
own injury, more than its due. By judgement, also, is
313
r TO POEMS (IBIS) 313
determined what arc the laws and appropriate graces of
every species of composition.'
The materials of Poetry, by these powers collected and
produced, are cast, by means of various moulds, into divers
forms. The moulds may be enumerated, and the fonns
specified, in the following order, ist. The Narrative, — in-
cluding the Epopceia, the Historic Poem, the Tale, the
Romance, the Mock-heroic, and, if the spirit of Homer will
tolerate such neighbourhood, that dear production of our
days, the metrical Novel. Of this Class, the distinguishing
mark is, that the Narrator, however liberally his speaking
agents be introduced, is himself the source from which
everything primarily flows. Epic Poets, in order that their
mode of composition may accord with the elevation of their
subject, represent themselves as singing from the inspiration
of the Muse, ' Arma virumque cano; ' but this is a fiction, in
modem times, of slight value ; the Iliad or the Paradise Lost
would gain little in our estimation by being chanted. The
Other poets who belong to this class are commonly content to
tell their tale ; — so that of the whole it may be affirmed that
they neither require nor reject the accompaniment of music.
2ndly, The Dramatic, — consisting of Tragedy, Historic
Drama, Comedy, and Masque, in which the Poet does not
appear at all in his own person, and where the whole action
is carried on by speech and dialogue of the agents; music
being admitted only incidentally and rarely. The Opera may
be placed here, inasmuch as it proceeds by dialogue; though
depending, to the degree that it does, upon music, it has a
strong claim to be ranked with the lyrical. The charac-
teristic and impassioned Epistle, of which Ovid and Pope
have given examples, considered as a species of monodrama,
may, withont impropriety, be placed in this class.
3rdly, The Lyrical, — containing the Hymn, the Ode, the
Elegy, the Song, and the Ballad; in all which, for the pro-
duction of their full effect, an accompaniment of music is
indispensable.
4thly, The Idylliura, — descriptive chiefly either of the
processes and appearances of external nature, as the Seasons
•As amtibility la barmony nf oumbm, lod the power of producing it.
■Tc invarialiir aiiendants upon the {acultiu abov* spcciSrd, nothing hu
tU WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
of Thomson ; or of characters, manners, and sentiments. 38
are Shen stone's Schoolmistress, The Cotter's Saturday
Night of Burns, The Two Dogs of the same Author; or of
these in conjunction with the appearances of Nature, as
most of the pieces of Theocritus, the Allegro and Penseroso
of Milton, Beattie's Minstrel, Goldsmith's Deserted Village.
The Epitaph, the Inscription, the Sonnet, most of the epistles
of poets writing in their own persons, and all loco-dcscrip-
tive poetry, belonging to this class.
5thly, Didactic, — the principal object of which is direct
instruction; as the Poem of Lucretius, the Georgxcs of
Virgil, The Fleece of Dyer. Mason's English Garden, &C
And. lastly, philosophical Satire, like that of Horace and
Juvenal; personal and occasional Satire rarely comprehend-
ing sufficient of the general in the individual to be digniGed
with the name of poetry.
Out of the three last has been constructed a composite
order, of which Young's Night Thoughts, and Cowper's
Task, are excellent examples.
It is dcducible from the above, that poems apparently
miscellaneous, may with propriety be arranged either with
reference to the powers of mind predominant in the pro-
duction of them; or to the mould in which they are cast; or,
lastly, to the subjects to which they relate. From each of
these considerations, the following Poems have been divided
into classes; which, that the work may more obviously cor*
respond with the course of human life, and for the sake of
exhibiting in it the three requisites of a legitimate whole, a
beginning, a middle, and an end, have been also arranged,
as far as it was possible, according to an order of time, com-
mencing with Childhood, and terminating with Old Age,
Death, and Immortality. My guiding wish was, that ibe
small pieces of which these volumes consist, thus discrim-
inated, might be regarded under a two- fold view; as com-
posing an entire work within themselves, and as adjuncts to
the philosophical Poem. The Recluse. This arrangement has
long presented itself habitually to my own mind. Never-
theless, I should have preferred to scatter the contents of
these volumes at random, if I had been persuaded that, by
the plan adopted, anything material would be taken from the
TO POEMS (IfilS)
315
. ttitural effect of the pieces, individually, on the mind of the
unreflecting Reader, 1 trust there is a sufficient variety in
each class to prevent this; while, for him who reads with
reflection, the arrangement will serve as a commentary
unostentatiously directing his attention to my purposes,
both particular and general. But, as I wish to guard against
the possibihty of misleading by tliis classification, it is proper
Erst to remind the Reader, that certain poems are placed
according to the powers of mind, in the Author's conception,
predominant in the production of them; predominant, which
implies the exertion of other iaculties in less degree. Where
there is more imagination than fancy in a poem, it is placed
under the head of imagination, and vice versa. Both the
above classes might without impropriety have been enlarged
from that consisting of ' Poems founded on the Affection ; '
as might this latter from those, and from the class ' proceed-
ing from Sentiment and Reflection.' The most striking char-
acteristics of each piece, mutual illustration, variety, and
proportion, have governed me throughout.
None of the other Classes, except those of Fancy and
Imagination, require any particular notice. But a remark
of general application may be made. All Poets, except the
dramatic, have been in the practice of feigning that their
works were composed to the music of the harp or lyre; with
what degree of affectation this has been done in modern times,
I leave to the judicious to determine. For my own part, I have
not been disposed to violate probability so far, or to make
such a large demand upon the Reader's charity. Some of
these pieces are essentially lyrical; and, therefore, cannot
have their due force without a supposed musical accompani-
ment; but, in much the greatest part, as a substitute for the
classic lyre or romantic harp, 1 require nothing more than
an animated or impassioned recitation, adapted to the sub-
ject. Po;ms, however humble in their kind, if they be good
in that kind, cannot read themselves; the law of long syllable
and short must not be so inflexible. — the letter of metre must
not be so impassive to the spirit of versification, — as to
deprive the Reader of all voluntary power to modulate, in
subordination to the sense, the music of the poem; — in the
same manner as his mind is left at liberty, and even sum-
WIIXIAM WOBDSWORTH
moned, to act upon its thoughts and Images- But. though
the accompaniment of a musical instrument be frequently
dispensed with, the true Poet does not therefore abandon
his privilege distinct from that of the mere Proseman;
■ Ibe running brooks
Let us come now to the consideraiion of the words Fancy
and Imagination, as employed in the classification of the
following Poems. "A man," says an intelligent author, ' has
imagination in proportion as he can distinctly copy in idea
the impressions of sense: it is the faculty which images
witiiin the mind the phenomena of sensation. A man has
fancy in proportion as he can call up, connect, or associate,
at pleasure, those internal images (ifiavTdZtn is to cause to ap-
pear) so as to complete ideal representations of absent ob-
jects. Imagination is the power of depicting, anJ fancy of
evoking and combining. The imagination is formed by
patient observation; the fancy by a voluntary activity in
shifting the scenery of the mind. The more accurate the
imagination, the more safely may a painter, or a poet, under-
take a delineation, or a description, without the presence of
the objects to be characterized. The more versatile the
fancy, the more original and striking will be the decorations
produced.'— Br I (f J A Synonyms discriminated, by IV. Taylor.
Is not this as if a man should undertake to supply an
account of a building, and be so intent upon what he had
discovered of the foundation, as to conclude his task with-
out once looking up at the superstructure? Here, as in other
instances throughout the volume, the judicious Author's
mind is enthralled by Etymology; he takes up the original
word as his guide and escort, and too often does not per-
ceive how soon he becomes its prisoner, without liberty to
tread in any path but that to which it confines him. It is not
easy to find out how imagination, thus explained, differs
from distinct remembrance of images ; or fancy from quick
and vivid recollection of them: each is nothing more than a
mode of memory. If the two words bear the above meaning,
and no other, what term is left to designate that faculty of
which the Poet is 'all compact;' he whose eyes glmces
TO POEMS (Mlfi)
»7
»
'Iroin earth to heaven, whose spiritual attributes body forth
what his pen is prompt in turning to shape; or what is left
to characterize Fancy, as insinuating herself into the heart
of objects with creative activity? — Imagination, in the sense
of the word as giving title to a class of the following Poems,
has no reference to images that are merely a faithful copy,
existing in the mind, of absent external objects; but is a
word of higher import, denoting operations of the mind
upon those objects, and processes of creation or of com-
position, governed by certain fixed laws. I proceed to
illustrate my meaning by instances. A parrot hangs from
the wires of his cage by his beak or by his claws; or a
inkey from the bough of a tree by his paws or his tail.
Each creature does so literally and actually. In the first
Eclogue of Virgil, the shepherd, thinking of the time when
he is to take leave of his farm, thus addresses his goats: —
Not) ego vos posthac virid! projectus in antro
Dumosa pendere procul de rupe videbo,
half way down
Hangs one who gathers samphire,
is the well-known expression of Shakespeare, delineating an
ordinary image upon the cliffs of Dover. In these two
instances is a slight exertion of the faculty which I denom-
inate imagination, in the use of one word ; neither the goats
nor the samphire-gatherer do literally hang, as does the
parrot or the monkey; but, presenting to the senses some-
thing of such an appearance, the mind in its activity, for
its own gratification, contemplates them as hanging.
As when far aS at sea a fleet descried
Hangt in the clouds, by equinoctial winds
Close Bailing from Beogala, or tbe isles
Of Ternate or Tidore. whence merchants bring
Their spicy drugs ; they on the trading flood
Through the wide Ethiopian to the Cape
Ply, MemminE nightly toward the Pole; so seemed
Far off tbe Sying Fiend.
Here is the full strength of the imagination involved in
the word hangs, and exerted upon the whole image ; First,
the fleet, an aggregate of many ships, is represented as one
318 WnXIAM WORDSWORTH
niighty person, whose track, we know and feel, is upon the
waters; but, taking advantage of its appearance to the
senses, the Poet dares to represent it as hanging in the
clouds, both for the gratification of the mind in contemplat-
ing the image itself, and in reference to the motion and ap-
pearance of the sublime objects to which it is compared.
From impressions of sight we will pass to those of sound;
which, as they must necessarily be of a less definite char-
acter, shall be selected from these volumes;
i
a sweet voice tlie Stock-dove troedt;
The stoctc-dove is said to coo, a sound well imitating the
note of the bird; but, by the intervention of the metaphor
broods, the affections are called in by the imagination to
assist in marking the manner in which the bird reiterates
and prolongs her soft note, as if herself deligiiting to listen
to it, and participating of a still and quiet satisfaction, like
that which may be supposed inseparable from the contin-
uous process of incubation. 'His voice was buried among
trees,' a metaphor expressing the love of seclusion by which
this Bird is marked ; and characterizing its note as not par-
taking of the shrill and the piercing, and therefore more
easily deadened by the intervening shade; yet a note so
peculiar and withal so pleasing, that the breeze, gifted with
that love of the sound which the Poet feels, penetrates the
shades in which it is entombed, and conveys it to the ear
of the listener.
Sball I call thee Bird,
Or but a waodering VciceT
This concise interrogation characterizes the seeming
ubiquity of the voice of the cuckoo, and dispossesses the
creature almost of a corporeal existence ; the Imagination be-
ing tempted to this exenion of her power by a consdonsnen
TO POEMG (1815)
319
[bi the nremory that the cuckoo is almost perpetually heard
throughout the season of spring, but seldom becomes an
object of sight.
Thus far of images independent of each other, and im-
mediately endowed by the mind with properties that do not
inhere in them, upon an incitement from properties and qual-
ities the existence of which is inherent and obvious. These
processes of imagination are carried on either by conferring
additional properties upon an object, or abstracting from it
some of those which it actually possesses, and thus enabling
it to react upon the mind which hath performed the process,
like a new existence.
1 pass from the Imagination acting upon an individual
image to a consideration of the same faculty employed upon
images in a conjunction by which they modify each other.
The Reader has already had a fine instance before him in the
passage quoted from Virgil, where the apparently perilous
situation of the goat, hanging upon the shaggy precipice, is
contrasted with that of the shepherd contemplating it from
the seclusion of the cavern in which he lies stretched at ease
and in security. Take these images separately, and how
unaffecting the picture compared with that produced by their
being thus connected with, and opposed to, each other I
Couched on the bald top of an eminence,
Wonder to all who do the same espy
By what means it could thither come, and whence
So that it Beems a thing endued with sense,
Like a sea-beast crawled forth, which on a shelf
Of rock or sand reposcth, there to sun himself.
Motionless as a cloud the old Man stood.
That heareth not the loud winds when they call.
And moveth altngethcr if it move at all.
In these images, the conferring, the abstracting, and the
modifying powers of the Imagination, immediately and me-
diately acting, are all brought into conjunction. The stone
is endowed with something of the power of life to approxi-
WIUJAM WORI>SWORTH
mate it to ihe sea-beast; and the sea-beast stripped of sonae
of its vital qualities to assimilate it to the stone; which inter-
mediate image is thus treated for the purpose of bringing
the original image, that of the stone, to a nearer resemblance
to the figure and condition of the aged Man; who is dirested
of so much of the indications of life and motion as to bring
him to the point where the two objects unite and coalesce in
just comparison. After what has been said, the image of the
cloud need not be commented upon.
Thus far of an endowing or modifying power: but the
Imagination also shapes and creates; and how? By in-
numerable processes; and in none does it more delight than
in that of consolidating numbers into unity, and dissolving
and separating unity into number,— alternations proceeding
from, and governed by, a sublime consciousness of the soul
in her own mighty and almost divine powers. Recur to the
passage already ciled from Milton. When the compact
Fleet, as one Person, has been introduced 'sailing from
Bengals,' ' They,' i. e. the ' merchants,' representing the
fleet resolved into a multitude of ships, 'ply' their voyage
towards the extremities of the earth: 'So' (referring lo
the word 'As* in the corameDcement) 'seemed the flying
Fiend'; the image of his Person acting to recombine the
multitude of ships into one body, — the point from which
the comparison set out. ' So seemed,' and to whom seemed?
To Ihe heavenly Muse who dictates the poem, to the eye
of the Poet's mind, and to that of the Reader, present at
one moment in the wide Ethiopian, and the next in the
solitudes, then first broken in upon, of the infernal regions!
Modo me Tbebis, modo ponit Attienis.
Hear again this mighty Poet, — speaking of the Messiah
going forth to expel from heaven the rebellious angels,
Attended by ten thousand thousand Saints
He onward came: far off his coining sbone, —
the retinue of Saints, and the Person of the Messiah himself.
lost almost and merged in the splendour of that indefinite
abstraction 'His coming!'
As I do not mean here to treat this subject further
TO POEMS (191S)
321
1 to throw some light upon the present Volumes, and
especially upon one division of them, I shall spare myself
and the Reader the trouble of considering the Imagination
as it deals with thoughts and sentiments, as it regulates
the composition of characters, and determines the course
of actions: I will not consider it (more than I have already
done by implication) as that power which, in the language of
one of my most esteemed Friends, ' draws all things to
one; which makes things animate or inanimate, beings
with their attributes, subjects with their accessories, take
one colour and serve to one effect'.' The grand store-
houses of enthusiastic and meditative Imagination, of poeti-
cal, as contra-distinguished from human and dramatic Im-
agination, are the prophetic and lyrical parts of the Holy
Scriptures, and the works of Milton; to which I cannot
forbear to add to those of Spenser. 1 select these writers
in preference to those of ancient Greece and Rome, be-
cause the anlhroporaorphitism of the Pagan religion sub-
jected the minds of the greatest poets in those countries
too much to the bondage of definite form; from which the
Hebrews were preserved by their abhorrence of idolatry.
This abhorrence was almost as strong in our great epic
Poet, both from circumstances of his life, and from the
constitution of his mind. However imbued the surface
might be with classical literature, he was a Hebrew in
soul ; and all things tended in him towards the sublime,
Spenser, of a gentler nature, maintained his freedom by
aid of his allegorical spirit, at one time inciting him to
create persons out of abstractions; and, at another, by a
superior effort of genius, to give the universality and
permanence of abstractions to his human beings, by means
of attributes and emblems that belong to the highest moral
truths and the purest sensations, — of which his character
of Una is a glorious example. Of the human and dramatic
Imagination the works of Shakespeare are an inexhaustible
source.
I tax not you, ye Elements, with unkiodDess,
I never gave you Wngdoins, call'd you Daughters I
I And if, bearing i
mind the many Poets distinguished
b upon the genius of Qogsitb.
k
SB TIXXtAM WORDSWORTH
by this prime quality, whose names I omit to mention;
yet justified by recollection of the insults which the ignor-
ant, the incapable, and the presumptuous, have heaped upon
these and my other writings, 1 may be pemiitted to an
pate the judgment of posterity upon myself, I shall de-
clare (censurable, I grant, if the notoriety of the fact
above stated does not justify me) that I have given in
these unfavourable times evidence of exertions of this
faculty upon its worthiest objects, the external universe,
the moral and religious sentiments of Man, his natural
affections, and his acquired passions; which have the s;
ennobling tendency as the productions of men, in this kind,
worthy to be holden in undying remembrance.
To the mode in which Fancy has already been char-
acterized as the power of evoking and combining, or, as
my friend Mr. Coleridge has styled it, 'the aggregatit
and associative power/ my objection is only that the defin
tion is too general. To aggregate and to associate, '
evoke and to combine, belong as wel! to the Imagination
as to the Fancy; but either the materials evoked and com-
bined arc different; or they are brought together under a
different law, and for a different purpose. Fancy does not
require that the materials which she makes use of should
be susceptible of change in their constitution, from
touch; and, where they admit of modification, it is enougb
for her purpose if it be slight, limited, and evanescent. Di-
rectly the reverse of these, are the desires and demands
of the Imagination. She recoils from everything but the
plastic, the pliant, and the indefinite. She leaves it to
Fancy to describe Queen Mab as coming.
Having to speak of stature, she does not tell you that
her gigantic Angel was as tall as Pompey's Pillar; much
less that he was twelve cubits, or twelve hundred cubits
high; or that his dimensions equalled those of Teneriffe
or Atlas ;— because these, and if they were a million times
as high it would be the same, are bounded: The expression
is, ' His stature readied the st^ I ' the illimitable firmi
TO POEHS (uu) aes
I'ttentl— When the Imagination frames a comparison, if
it does not strike on the first presentation, a sense of th»
truth of tlie likeness, from the moment that it is perceived,
grows — and continues to grow — upon the mind; the re-
semblance depending less upon outline of form and fea-
ture, than upon expression and effect; less upon casual
and outstanding, than upon inherent and internal, proper-
ties : moreover, the images invariably modify each other.
• — The law under which the processes of Fancy are car-
Tied on is as capricious as the accidents of things, and the
effects are surprising, playful, ludicrous, amusing, tender,
or pathetic, as the objects happen to be appositely pro-
duced or fortunately combined. Fancy depends upon the
rapidity and profusion with which she scatters her thoughts
and images; trusting that their number, and the felicity
with which they are linked together, will make amends
for the want of individual value: or she prides herself
upon the curious subtilty and the successful elaboration
with which she can detect their lurking affinities. If she
can win you over to her purpose, and impart to you her
feelings, she cares not how unstable or transitory may
be her influence, knowing that it will not be out of her
power to resume it upon an apt occasion. But the Imagin-
ation is conscious of an indestructible dominion; — the Soul
may fall away from it, not being able to sustain its grandeur;
but, if once felt and acknowledged, by no act of any other
faculty of the mind can it be relaxed, impaired, or dimin-
ished. — Fancy is given to quicken and to beguile the tem-
poral part of our nature. Imagination to incite and to sup-
port the eternal. — Yet is it not the less true that Fancy,
as she is an active, is also, under her own laws and in
her own spirit, a creative faculty? In what manner Fancy
ambitiously aims at a rivalship with Imagination, and Im-
agination stoops to work with the materials of Fancy, might
be illustrated from the compositions of all eloquent writers,
whether in prose or verse; and chiefly from those of our
own Country. Scarcely a page of the impassioned parts
of Bishop Taylor's Works can be opened that shall not afford
examples. — Referring the Reader to those inestimable vol-
umes, I will content myself with placing a conceit (ascribed
WnXIAU WORDSWORTH
rto Lord Chesterfield) i
I Paradise Lost:
I contrast with a passage from the
After the transgression of Adam, Milton, with other ap-
pearances of sympathizing Nature, thus marks the im-
mediate consequence.
The associating link is the same in each instance: Dew
and rain, not distinguishable from the liquid substance of
tears, are employed as indications of sorrow. A flash of
surprise is the effect in the former case; a flash of sur-
prise, and nothing more ; for the nature of things does not
sustain the combination. In the latter, the effects from the
act. of which there is this immediate consequence and
visible sign, are so momentous, that the mind acknowledges
the justice and reasonableness of the sympathy in nature so
manifested; and the sky weeps drops of water as if with
human eyes, as ' ^arth had before trembled from her
entrails, and Nature given a second groan.'
Finally, I will refer to Cotton's Ode upon Winler, an ad-
mirable composition, though stained with some peculiarities
of the age in which he lived, for a general illustration of the
characteristics of Fancy. The middle part of this ode con-
tains a most lively description of the entrance of Winter,
with his retinue, as 'A palsied king,' and yet a military
monarch, — advancing for conquest with his army; the
several bodies of which, and their arms and equipments,
are described with a rapidity of detail, and a profusion of
fanciful comparisons, which indicate on the part of the poet
extreme activity of intellect, and a correspondent hurry of
delighltul feeling. Winter retires from the foe into his
fortress, where
a magaiine
Of sovereign juice is cellared In;
Liquor that will the siege maintafn
Should Phcebiu ae'er return again.
TO POEMS (1815) 32S
■Tiou^ myself a water drinker, I cannot resist the pleasure
of transcribing what follows, as an instance still more happy
of Fancy employed in the treatment of feeling than, in its
preceding passages, the Poem supplies of her management
_o£ forms.
Tis that, Iliat gives the poet rag;e,
And thaws [he gelid blood of age;
Uatures the young, restores tbe old,
And makes the faiating coward bold.
It lays the careful bead to rest,
Calms palpitations in the breast. '
Renders our lives' misforiune sweet ;
Then let the chill Sirocco blow,
And gird us round with hilis of snow.
Or else go whistle to the shore,
And make the hollow mountains roar.
Whilst we together jovia! sit
Careless, and crowned with mirth and wit.
Where, though bleak winds confine us home
Our fancies round the world shall ronm.
We'll think of all the Friends we know,
And drink to all worth drinking to;
When having drunk all thine and mine.
We rather shall want healths than wine.
But where Friends fail us, we'll supply
Our friendships with our charity ;
Men that remote in sorrows live.
Shall by our lusty brimmers thrive.
We'll drink the wanting into wealthy
And those Ibat languish into health,
The afflicted into joy; Ih' opprest
Into security and resL
The worthy in disgrace shall find
Favour return again more kind,
And in restraint who stifled lie,
Shell taste the air of liberty.
The brave shall triumph in success,
The lover shall have mislressea.
Poor unregarded Virtue, praise,
And the neglected Poet, bays.
326 WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
Thus shall our healths do others good.
Whilst we ourselves do all we would;
For, freed from envy and from care,
What would we be but what we are?
When I sate down to write this Preface, it was my inten-
tion to have made it more comprehensive; but, thinking
that I ought rather to apologize for detaining the reader so
long, I will here conclude.
ESSAY SUPPLEMENTARY TO
PREFACE
(18.5)
WITH the young of both sexesj Poetry is, Hkc love, a
passion; but, for much the greater part of those
who have been proud of its power over their minds,
a necessity soon arises of breaking the pleasing bondage ; or
it relaxes oi itself; — the thoughts being occupied in domestic
cares, or the time engrossed by business. Poetry then becomes
only an occasional recreation ; while to those whose existence
passes away in a course of fashionable pleasure, it is a species
of luxurious amusement. In middle and declining age,
scattered number of serious persons resort to poetry, as t
religion, for a protection against the pressure at trivial era
ployments, and as a consolation for the afflictions of life.
And, lastly, there are many, who, having been enamoured
of this art in their youth, have found leisure, after youth was
spent, to cultivate general literature ; in which poetry has
continued to be comprehended as a study.
Into the above classes the Readers of poetry may be
divided; Critics abound in them all; but from the last only
can opinions be collected of absolute value, and worthy to
he depended upon, as prophetic of the destiny of a new work.
The young, who in nothing can escape delusion, are especial-
ly subject to it in their intercourse with Poetry. The cause,
not so obvious as the fact is unquestionable, is the same as
that from which erroneous judgements in this art, in
minds of men of all ages, chiefly proceed; but upon Youth
it operates with peculiar force. The appropriate business
of poetry {which, nevertheless, if genuine, is as permanent
as pure science), her appropriate employment, her privilege
and her duty, is to treat of things not as they are, but as
they appear; not as they exist in themselves, but as they stem
to exist to the settses, and to the passions. What a world of
327
WILOAM WORDSWORTH
delusion docs this acknowledged obligation prepare for the
inexperienced ! what temptations to go astray are here held
forth for them whose thoughts have tieen little disciplined by
the understanding, and whose feelings revolt from the sway
of reason! — When a juvenile Reader is in the height of his
rapture with some vicious passage, should experience throw
in doubts, or common sense suggest suspicions, a lurking
consciousness that the realities of the Muse are but shows,
and that her liveliest excitements are raised by transient
shocks of conflicting feeling and successive assemblages of
contradictory thoughts — is ever at hand to justify extrav-
agance, and to sanction absurdity. But, it may be asked, as
these illusions are unavoidable, and, no doubt, eminently
useful to the mind as a process, what good can be gained by
making observations, the tendency of which is to diminish
the confidence of youth in its feelings, and thus to abridge its
innocent and even proiitable pleasures? The reproach im-
plied in the question could not be warded off, if Youth were
incapable of being delighted with what is truly excellent ; or,
if these errors always terminated of themselves in due sea-
son. But, with the majority, though their force be abated,
they continue through life. Moreover, the fire of youth
is too vivacious an element to be extinguished or damped
by a philosophical remark; and, while there is no danger
that what has been said will be injurious or painful to the
ardent and the confident, it may prove beneficial to those
who, being enthusiastic, are, at the same time, modest and
ingenuous. The intimation may unite with their own mis-
givings to regulate their sensibility, and to bring in, sooner
than it would otherwise have arrived, a more discreet and
sound judgement.
If it should excite wonder that men of ability, in later
life, whose understandings have been rendered acute by
practice in affairs, should be so easily and so far imposed
upon when they happen to take up a new work in verse,
this appears to be the cause; — that, having discontinued
their attention to poetry, whatever progress may have been
made in other departments of knowledge, they have not, as
to this art, advanced in true discernment beyond the age of
jxmth. If, then, a new poem fall in their way, irhose : '
SUPPLEMENTARY ESSAY (1815) 329
ractions arc of that kind which would have enraptured
aem during the heat of youth, the judgement not being
improved to a degree that they shall be disgusted, they
are dazzled; and prize and cherish the faults for having
had power to make the present time vanish before them, and
to throw the mind back, as hy enchantment, into the happiest
season of life. As they read, powers seem to be revived,
passions are regenerated, and pleasures restored. The Book
was probably taken up after an escape from the burden of
business, and with a wish to forget the world, and all its
vexations and anxieties. Having obtained this wish, and
so much more, it is natural that they should make report
as they have felt.
If Men of mature age, through want of practice, be thus
easily beguiled into admiration of absurdities, extravagances,
and misplaced ornaments, thinking it proper that their under-
standings should enjoy a holiday, while they are unbending
their minds with verse, it may be expected that such Readers
will resemble their former selves also in strength of prejudice,
and an inaptitude to be moved by the unostentatious beauties
of a pure style. In the higher poetry, an enlightened Critic
chiefly looks for a reflection of the wisdom of the heart
and the grandeur of the imagination. Wherever these ap-
pear, simplicity accompanies them; Magnificence herself,
when legitimate, depending upon a simplicity of her ovm,
to regulate her ornaments. But it is a well-known property
of human nature, that our estimates are ever governed by
comparisons, of which we are conscious with various de-
grees of distinctness. Is it not, then, inevitable (confining
these observations to the effects of style merely) that an eye,
accustomed to the glaring hues of diction by which such
Readers are caught and excited, will for the most part
be rather repelled than attracted by an original Work, the
colouring of which is disposed according to a pure and re-
fined scheme of harmony? It is in the fine arts as in the
affairs of life, no man can serve (i, e. obey with zeal and
fidelity) two Masters,
As Poetry is most just to its own divine origin when it
administers the comforts and breathes the spirit of religion,
they who have learned to perceive this truth, and who be-
WILUAM WORDSWOBTH
take tbemselves to reading verse for aacred purposes, must
be preserved from numerous illusions to which the two
Gasses of Readers, whom we have been considering, are
liable. But, as the mind grows serious from the weight of
life, the range of its passions is contracted accordingly;
and its sympathies become so exclusive, that many species
of high excellence wholly escape, or but languidly excite,
its notice. Besides, men who read from religious or moral
inclinations, even when the subject is of that kind which
they approve, are beset with misconceptions and mistakes
peculiar to themselves. Attaching so much importance to
the truths which interest them, they are prone to over-
rate the Authors by whom those truths are expressed
and enforced. They come prepared to impart so much pas-
sion to the Poet's language, that they remain unconscious
how little, in fact, they receive from it. And, on the other
hand, religious faith is to him who holds it so momentous
a thing, and error appears to be attended with such tremend-
ous consequences, that, if opinions touching upon religion
occur which the Reader condemns, he not only cannot sym-
pathize with them, however animated the expression, but
there is, for the most part, an end put to all satisfaction
and enjoyment. Love, if it before existed, is converted into
dislike; and the heart of the Reader is set against the Author
and his book. — To these excesses, they, who from their pro-
fessions ought to be the most guarded against them, arc
perhaps the most liable; I mean those sects whose religion,
being from the calculating understanding, is cold and formal.
For when Christianity, the religion of humility, is founded
upon the proudest faculty of our nature, what can be ex-
pected but contradictions? Accordingly, believers of this
cast are at one time contemptuous; at another, being
troubled, as they are and must be, with inward misgivings,
they are jealous and suspicious ; — and at all seasons, they
are under temptation to supply by the heat with which they
defend their tenets, the animation which ts vranting to the
constitution of the religion itself.
Faith was given to man that his affections, detached from
the treasures of time, might be inclined to settle upon those
of eternity; — the elevation of his nature, which this habit
SUPPLEMENTAHY ESSAY (1815) JSJ
produces on earth, being to him a presumptive evidence of
a future state of existence; and giving him a title to par-
take of its holiness. The religious man values what he sees
chiefly as an ' imperfect shadowing forth ' of what he is in-
capable of seeing. The concerns of religion refer to indefinite
objects, and are too weighty for the mind to support them
without relieving itself by resting a great part of the burthen
upon words and symbols. The commerce between Man and
his Maker cannot be carried on but by a process where much
is represented in Utile, and the Infinite Being accommodates
himself to a finite capacity. In all this may be perceived
the affinity between religion and poetry; between religion-
making up the deficiencies of reason by faith; and poetry
— passionate for the instruction of reason; between reli-
gion — whose element is infinitude, and whose ultimate
trust is the supreme of things, submitting herself to cir-
cumscription, and reconciled to substitutions ; and poetry
— ethereal and transcendent, yet incapable to sustain her
existence without sensuous incarnation. In this community
of nature may be perceived also the lurking incitements of
kindred error; — so that we shall find that no poetry has
been more subject to distortion, than that species, the argu-
ment and scope of which is religious; and no lovers of the
art have gone farther astray than the pious and the devout.
Whither then shall we turn for that union of qualifica-
tions which must necessarily exist before the decisions of
a critic can be of absolute value? For a mind at once
poetical and philosophical; for a critic whose affections are
as free and kindly as the spirit of society, and whose un-
derstanding is severe as that of dispassionate government?
Where are we to look for that initiatory composure of
mind which no selfishness can disturb? For a natural sensi-
bility that has been tutored into correctness without losing
anything of its quickness; and for active faculties, capable
of answering the demands which an Author of original
imagination shall make upon them, associated with a judge-
ment that cannot he duped into admiration by aught that is
unworthy of it? — among those and those only, who, never
having suffered their youthful love of poetn,' to remit much
of its iorcc^ have applied to the consideration of the laws
WIU-IAM WORDSWOHTH
of this art the best power of their understandings. At the
same time it must be observed — that, as this Class com-
prehends the only judgements which are trustworthy, so does
it include the most erroneous and perverse. For to be
mistaughl is worse than to be untaught ; and no perverse-
ness equals that which is supported by system, no errors are
so difficult to root out as those whicli tlie understanding has
pledged its credit to uphold. In this Class are contained
censors, who, if they be pleased with what is good, are
pleased with it only by imperfect glimpses, and upon false
principles ; who, should they generalize rightly, to a certain
point, are sure to suffer for it in the end; who, if they
stumble upon a sound rule, are fettered by misapplying it,
or by straining it too far; being incapable pf perceiving
when it ought to yeild to one of higher order. In it are
found critics too petulant to* be passive to a genuine poet,
and too feeble to grapple with him; men, who take upon
them to report of the course which he holds whom they
are utterly unable to accompany, — confounded if he turn
quick upon the wing, dismayed if he soar steadily ' into
the region"; — men of palsied imaginations and indurated
hearts; in whose minds all healthy action is languid, who
therefore feed as the many direct them, or, with the many,
are greedy after vicious provocatives ; — judges, whose cen-
sure is auspicious, and whose praise ominous ! In this class
meet together the two extremes of best and worst,
The observations presented in the foregoing series are
of too ungracious a nature to have been made without re-
luctance ; and, were it only on this account, I would invite
the reader to try them by the test of comprehensive ex-
perience. If the number of judges who can be confidently
relied upon be in reality so small, it ought to follow that
partial notice only, or neglect, perhaps long continued, or
attention wholly inadequate to their merits — must have been
the fate of most works in the higher departments of poetry;
and that, on the other hand, numerous productions have
blazed into popularity, and have passed away, leaving scarcely
a trace behind them: it will be further found, that when
Authors shall have at length raised themselves into general
admiration and maintained their ground, errors and prejU'
StJPPLEMENTARY ESSAY (1B15)
ices have prevailed concerning their genius and their works,
Arfiich the few who are conscious o! those errors and preju-
dices would deplore; if they were not recompensed by per-
ceiving that there are select Spirits for whom it is ordained
that their fame shall be in the world an existence like that
of Virtue, which owes its being to the struggles it makes,
and its vigour to the enemies whom it provokes; — a vi-
vacious quality, ever doomed to meet with opposition, and
still triumphing over it; and, from the nature of its do-
minion, incapable of being brought to the sad conclusion of
Alexander, when he wept that there were no more worlds
for him to conquer.
Let us take a hasty retrospect of the poetical literature of
this Country for the greater part of the last two centuries,
and see if the facts support these inferences.
Who is there that now reads the Creation of Dubartas?
Yet all Europe once resounded with his praise; he was
caressed by kings ; and, when his Poem was translated into
our language, the Faery Queen faded before it. The name
of Spenser, whose genius is of a higher order than even
that of Ariosto, is at this day scarcely known beyond the
limits of the British Isles. And if the value of his works is
to be estimated from the attention now paid to them by his
countrymen, compared with that which they bestow on those
of some other writers, it must be pronounced small indeed.
words; but his wisdom has, in this particular,
■*t»een his worst enemy: while i(s opposite, whether in the
shape of folly or madness, has been tlieir best friend. But
he was a great power, and bears a high name : the laurel has
been awarded to him.
A dramatic Author, if he write for the stage, must adapt
himself to the taste of the audience, or they will not endure
him; accordingly the mighty genius of Shakespeare was lis-
tened to. The people were delighted: but I am not suf-
ficiently versed in stage antiquities to determine whether
they did not flock as eagerly to the representation of many
pieces of contemporary Authors, wholly undeserving to ap-
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
pear upon tbe same boards. Had there been a lomal contest
for superiority among dramatic writers, that Shakespeare,
like his predecessors Sophocles and Euripides, would have
often been subject to the mortification of seeing the priic
adjudged to sorry competitors, becomes too probable, when
we reflect that the admirers of Settle and Shadwell were, in
a, later age, as numerous, and reckoned as respectable, in
point of talent, as those of Dryden, At all events, that
Shakespeare stooped to accommodate himself to the Peo-
ple, is sufficiently apparent; and one of the most striking
proofs of his almost omnipotent genius is, that he could turn
to such glorious purpose those materials which the prepoS'
sessions of the age compelled him to make use of. Yet even
this marvellous skill appears not to have been enough to
prevent his rivals from having some advantage over him
in public estimation ; else how can we account for passages
and scenes that exist in his works, unless upon a supposition
that some of the grossest of them, a fact which in my own
mind I have no doubt of, were foisted in by the Players,
for the gratification of the many ?
But that his Works, whatever might be their reception
upon the stage, made but little impression upon the mling
Intellects of the time, may be inferred from the fact tiiat
Lord Bacon, in his multifarious writings, nowhere either
quotes or alludes to him.* His dramatic e^tcellence enabled
him to resume possession of the stage afler the Restoration ;
but Dryden tells us that in his time two of the plays of
Beaumont and Fletcher were acted for one of Shakespeare's.
And so faint and limited was the perception of the poetic
beauties of his dramas in the time of Pope, that, in his Edi-
tion of the Plays, with a view of rendering to the general
reader a necessary service, he printed between inverted com-
mas those passages which he thought most worthy of notice.
At this day, the French Critics have abated nothing of
their aversion to this darling of our Nation: 'the English,
with their boufFon de Shakespeare,' is as familiar an ex'
■TIiB teamed Hibewill fa third edition e
wriUne lo refute the etror ■ to-.^hmB N.
Stay.' cilBS triumphinll)' the nan
tlHi of Skaktvearc
fftiDSe book tvan (ttle 1635),
SUPPLEMENTARY BSSAY (181S) SSB
presilon among them as in the time of Voltaire. Baron
Grimm is the only French writer who seems to have pcr^
ceived his infinite superiority to the first names of the French
Theatre ; an advantage which the Parisian Critic owed to his
German blood and German education. The most enlightened
Italians, though well acquainted with our language. arA
wholly incompetent to measure the proportions of Shake-
speare. The Germans only, of foreign nations, are ap-
proaching towards a knowledge and feeling of what he is.
In some respects they have acquired a superiority over the
fellow countrymen of the Poet: for among us it is a cur-
rent, I might say, an estabhshed opinion, that Shakespeare
is justly praised when he is pronounced to be ' a wild ir-
regular genius, in whom great faults are compensated by
great beauties.' How long may it be before this miscon-
ception passes away, and it becomes universally acknowl-
edged that the judgement of Shakespeare in the selection of
his materials, and in the manner in which he has made
them, heterogeneous as they often are, constitute a unity of
their own, and contribute all to one great end, is not less
admirable than his imagination, his invention, and his in-
tuitive knowledge of human Nature?
There is extant a small Volume of miscellaneous poems,
in which Shakespeare expresses his own feelings in his owD
person. It is not diJBcuIt to conceive that the Editor, George
Steevens, should have been insensible to the beauties of
one portion of that Volume, the Soimets ; though in no part
of the writings of this Poet is found, in an equal compass,
a greater number of exquisite feelings felicitously expressed.
But, from regard to the Critic's own credit, he would not
have ventured to talk of an' act of parliament not being
strong enough to compel the perusal of those little pieces,
if he had not known that the people of England were ig-
norant of the treasures contained in them: and if he had
not, moreover, shared the too common propensity of human
nature to exult over a supposed fall into the mire of a genius
flippant ii
3 publicly T
rehmded by Mr. ColcridgE in
tVr 1<17> io8> I09> I
1I3> Ii4i ii<Si Ii7i I39i and m
WILUAH WORDSW OB T H
whom he had been eompelled to regard whfa sdminltcm, U
an inmate of the celutUI regioas— ' tbere sitting where be
iant not soar.'
Nine years before the death of Shakespeare, Milton was
bom; and early in life be published several small poems,
which, though on their first appearance tbey were praised
by a few of the judicious, were afterwards neglected to
that degree, that Pope in his youth could borrow from them
without risk of its being Icnown. Whether these poems are
at this day justly appreciated, I will not undertake to de-
cide: nor would it imply a serere re6ection upon the mass
of readers to suppose the contrary; seeing that a man of the
acknowledged genius of Voss, the German poet, could sufTet
their spirit to evaporate; and could change their character,
as is done in the translation made by him of the most popular
of these pieces. At all events, it is certain that these Poems
of Milton are now much read, and loudly praised ; yet were
thej- little heard of till more than 150 years after their pob-
li'-ation; and oC the Sonnets, Dr. Johnson, as appears from
Boswell's Life of him. was in the habit of thinking and
speaking as contemptuously as Steevens wrote upon those
of Shakespeare.
About the time when the Pindaric odes of Cowley and
his imitators, and the productions of that class of curious
thinkers whom Dr. Johnson has strangely styled meta-
physical Poets, were beginning to lose something of that
extravagant admiration which they had excited, the Paradise
Lost made its appearance. ' Fit audience find though few,'
was the petition addressed by the Poet to his inspiring Muse,
I have said elsewhere that he gained more than he asked;
this I believe to be true; but Dr. Johnson has fallen into a
gross mistake when he attempts to prove, by the sale of the
work, that Milton's Countrjmen were ' jitsi to it' upon its
first appearance. Thirteen hundred Copies were sold in two
years; an uncommon example, he asserts, of the prevalence
of genius in opposition to so much recent enmity as Milton's
public conduct had excited. But, be it remembered that, if
Milton's political and religious opinions, and the manner in
which he announced them, had raised him many enemies,
they had procured him numerous friends ; who, as all per*
sonal danger was passed away at the time of publication,
would be eager to procure the master-work of a man whom
they revered, and wiiom they would be proud of praising.
Take, from the number of purchasers, persons of this class,
and also those who wished to possess the Poem as a re-
ligious work, and but few I fear would be left who sought
for it on account of its poetical merits. The demand did not
immediately increase ; ' for,' says Dr. Jolmson. ' many more
readers' (he means persons in the habit of reading poetry)
' than were supplied at first the Nation did not afford' How
careless must a writer be who can make this assertion in the
face of so many existing title-pages to belie it ! Turning to
my own shelves, I find the folio qi Cowley, seventh edition,
1681. A book near it is Flatraan's Poems, fourth edition,
1686; Waller, fifth edition, same date. The Poems of Norris
of Bemerton not long after went, I believe, through nine
editions. What further demand there might be for these
works I do not know ; but I well remember that, twenty-five
years ago, the booksellers' stalls in London swarmed with
the folios of Cowley. This is not mentioned in disparage-
ment of that able writer and amiable man; but merely to
show that, if Milton's Works were not more read, it was not
because readers did not exist at the time. The early editions
of the Paradise Lost were printed in a shape which allowed
them to be sold at a low price, yet only three thousand
copies of the Work were sold in eleven years; and the Nation,
says Dr. Johnson, had been satisfied from 1623 to 1664, that
is, forty-one years, with only two editions of the Works of
Shakespeare ; which probably did not together make one
thousand Copies ; facts adduced by the critic to prove the
'paucity of Readers." — There were readers in multitudes;
but their money went for other purposes, as their admiration
was fixed elsewhere. We are authorized, then, to affirm that
the reception of the Paradise Lost, and the slow progress of
its fame, are proofs as striking as can be desired that the
positions which I am attempting to establish are not errone-
ous.' — How amusing to shape to one's self such a critique as
IBngbM is npreu upon Ih
Worhs to Lord Sancrs, he wrilc
1 btauiiful edition of Paradite
Poau to be Bcserally known an
Bubjeci
of Sppn
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
a Wit of Charles's days, or a Lord of the Miscellani&s or
trading Journalht o£ King William's time, would have
brought forth, if he had set his faculties industriously lo
work upon this Poem, everywhere impregnated with original
excellence.
So strange indeed are the obliquities of admiration, that
thcy whose opinions are much influenced by authority will
often be tempted to think that ihere are no fixed principles'
in human nature for this art to rest upon. I have been
honoured by being permitted to peruse in MS. a tract com-
posed between the period of the Revolution and the close of
that century. It is the Work of an English Peer of high
accomplishments, its object to form the character and direct
the studies of his son. Perhaps nowhere does a more beau-
tiful treatise of the kind exist The good sense and wisdom
of the thoughts, the delicacy of the feelings, and the charm
of the style, are, throughout, equally conspicuous. Yet the
Author, selecting among the Poets of his own country those
whom he deems most worthy of his son's perusal, particular-
izes only Lord Rochester, Sir John Denhara, and Cowley.
Writing about the same time, Shaftesbury, an author at
present unjustly depreciated, describes the English Muses as
only yet lisping in their cradles.
The arts by which Pope, soon afterwards, contrived to
procure to himself a more general and a higher reputation
than perhaps any English Poet ever attained during his
lifetime, are known to the judicious. And as well known is
it to them, that the undue exertion of those arts is the cause
why Pope has for some time held a rank in literature, to
which, if he had not been seduced by an over-love of im-
mediate popularity, and had confided more in his native
genius, he never could have descended. He bewitched the
nation by his melody, and dazzled it by his polished style
and was himself blinded by his own success. Having wan-
dered from humanity in his Eclogues with boyish inexperi-
ence, the praise, which these compositions obtained, tempted
him into a belief that Nature was not to be trusted, at least
in pastoral Poetry. To prove this by example, he put his
•This opinion iptm! aclually to haTf bfdn enlrrtained by Adam Smith.
>ho worst cnlic. David Hume not f.depted, that Seotland, a uU to which
Oiii Kin of wetd Bcema natuial, luu produwd.
SUPPLEMEKTAHT ESSAY (1915) 339
snd Gay upon writing those Eclogues which their author
intended to be burlesque. The instigator of the work, and
his admirers, could perceive in them nothing but what was
ridiculous. Nevertheless, though these Poems contain some
detestable passages, the effect, as Dr. Johnson well observes,
' of reality and truth became conspicuous even when the
intention was to show them grovelling and degraded.' The
Pastorals, iudicrons to such as prided themselves upon their
refinement, in spite of those disgusting passages, 'became
popular, and were read with delight, as just representations
of rural manners and occupations.'
Something less than sixty years after the publication of
the Paradise Lost appeared Thomson's Winter; which was
speedily followed by his other Seasons. It is a work of
inspiration ; much of it ts written from himself, and nobly
from himself. How was it received? 'It was no sooner
read,' says one of his contemporary biographers, ' than uni-
versally admired: those only excepted who had not been used
to feel, or to look for anything in poetry, beyond a point
of satirical or epigrammatic wit, a smart antithesis richly
trimmed with rime, or the softness of an elegiac complaint.
To such his manly classical spirit could not readily com-
mend itself ; till, after a more attentive perusal, they had
got the better of their prejudices, and either acquired or
affected a truer taste. A few others stood aloof, merely
because they had long before fixed the articles of their
poetical creed, and resigned themselves to an absolute de-
spair of ever seeing anything new and original. These were
somewhat mortified to find their notions disturbed by the
appearance of a poet, who seemed to owe nothing but to
nature and his own genius. But, in a short time, the ap-
plause became unanimous; every one wondering how so
many pictures, and pictures so familiar, should have moved
them but faintly to what they felt in his descriptions. His
digressions too, the overflowings of a tender benevolent
heart, charmed the reader no less ; leaving him in dotibt,
whether he should more admire the Poet or love the Man,'
This case appears to bear strongly against us: — but
we must distinguish belween wonder and legitimate admira-
tion. The subject of the work is the changes produced in
HO
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
the appearances of nature by the revolution of the year:
and, ijj undertaking to write in verse, Thomson pledged
himself to treat his subject as became a Poet Now, it is
remarkable that, excepting the nocturnal Reverie of Lady
IVinckcUea, and a passage or two in the IVindsor Forest
of Pope, the poetry of the period intervening between the
publicalion of the Paradise Lost and the Seasons does not
contain a single new image of external nature ; and scarcely
presents a familiar one from which it can be inferred that the
eye of the Poet has been steadily fixed upon his object, much
less that his feelings hLd urged him to work upon it in
the spirit of genuine imagination. To what a low state
knowledge of the most obvipus and important phenomena
had sunk, is evident from the style in which Dryden has
executed a description of Night in one of his Tragedies,
and Pope his translation of the celebrated moonh'ght scene
in the Iliad. A blind man, in the habit of attending ac-
curately to descriptions casually dropped from the lips of
those around him, might easily depict these appearances with
more truth. Drydcn's lines are vague, bombastic, and sense-
less;' those of Pope, though he had Homer to guide him,
are throughout false and contradictory. The verses of Dry-
den, once highly celebrated, are forgotten; those of Pope
stilJ retain their hold upon public estimation, — nay, there is
not a passage of descriplive poetry, which at this day finds
so many and such ardent admirers. Strange to think of an
enthusiast, as may have been the case with thousands, re-
citing those verses under the cope of a moonlight sky,
without having his raptures in the least disturbed by a sus-
picion of their absurdity ! — If these two distinguished writers
could habitually think that the visible universe was of so
little consequence to a poet, that it was scarcely necessary
for him to cast his eyes upon it, we may be assured that
those passages of the elder poets which faithfully and poeti-
cally describe the phenomena of nature, were not at that
't Iniu* Emfmr-
SUPPLEMENTARY ESSAY (I81S)
341
e bolden in much estimation, and that there was little ac-
iMirate attention paid to those appearances.
Wonder is the natural product of Ignorance; and as the
soil was »H suck good condition at the time of the publication
of the Seasons the crop was doubtless abundant. Neither in-
dividuals nor nations become corrupt all at once, nor are they
enlightened in a moment Thomson was an inspired poet,
but he could not work miracles; in cases where the art
of seeing had in some degree been learned, the teaclier would
further the proficiency of his pupils, but he could do little
more; though so far does vanity assist men in acts of self-
deception, that many would often fancy ttiey recognized a
likeness when they knew nothing of the original. Having
shown that much of what his biographer deemed genuine
admiration must in fact have been blind wonderment — how
is ihe rest to be accounted for? — Thomson was fortunate
in the very title of his poem, which seemed to bring it home
to the prepared sympathies of every one : in the next place,
notwithstanding his high powers, he writes a vicious style;
and his false ornament^ are exactly of that kind which would
be most likely to strike the undisceming. He likewise
abounds with sentimental commonplaces, that, frorn the
manner in which they were brought forward, bore an im-
posing air of novelty. In any well-used copy of the Seasons
the book generally opens of itself with the rhapsody on love,
or with one of the stories ( perhaps ' Damon and Musidora') ;
these also are prominent in our collections of Extracts, and
are the parts of his Work which, after all, were probably
most efficient in first recommending the author to general
notice. Pope, repaying praises which he had received, and
wishing to extol him to the highest, only styles him 'an
elegant and philosophical Poet'; nor are we able to collect
any unquestionable proofs that the true characteristics of
Thomson's genius as an imaginative poet " were perceived,
til! the elder Warton, almost forty years after the publica-
tion of the Seasons, pointed them out by a note in his
■ upon Thou
"wEoie wor'i
•
WIIXtAM WORDSWORTH
E»ay on the Life and Writings of Pope. In the Castle of
Indolence (of which Gray speaks so coldly) these charac-
teristics were almost as conspicuously displayed, and io
verse more hiirmonioits aod diction more pure. Yet that
fine poem was neglected on its appearance, and is at this day
the delight only of a fewl
When Thomson died, Collins breathed forth his regrets
an Elegiac Poem, in whicli he pronounces a poetical curse
Upon him who should regard with insensibihty the place
where the Poet's remains were deposited. The Poems of
the mourner himself have now passed through innumerable
editions, and are universally known; but if, when Collins
died, the same kind o( imprecation had been pronounced
by a surviving admirer, small is the number whom it would
not have comprehended- The notice which his poems at-
tained during his lifetime was so small, and of course the
sale so insignificant, that not long before his death he deemed
it right to repay to the bookseller the sum which he had ad-
vanced for them and threw the edition into the fire.
Next in importance to the Seasons of Thomson, though
a considerable distance from that work in order of time,
come the Reliqucs of Ancient English Poetry; collected, new-
modelled, and in many instances (if such a contradiction in
terms may be used) composed by the Editor, Dr. Percy.
This work did not steal silently into the world, as is evident
from the number of legendary tales, that appeared not long
after its publication; and had been modelled, as the authors
persuaded themselves, after the old Ballad. The Compila-
tion was, however, ill suited to the then existing taste of
city society ; and Dr. Johnson, "mid the little senate to which
he gave laws, was not sparing in his exertions to make it an
object of contempt. The critic triumphed, the legendary n
itators were deservedly disregarded, and, as undeservedly,
their ill-imitated models sank, in this country, into temporary
neglect; while Burger, and other able writers of Germany,
were translating or imitating these Reliques, and composing,
with the aid of inspiration thence derived, poems which a
the delight of the German nation. Dr. Percy was so abashed
by the ridicule flung upon his labours from the ignorance
uid insensibility of the persons with whom he lived, that.
SUPPLEMENTARY ESSAY (181S) 343
I while he was writing under a mask lie had not
wanted resolution to follow his genius into the regions of
true simplicity and genuine pathos (as is evinced by the
exquisite ballad of Sir CauUne and by many other pieces),
yet when he appeared in his own person and character as
a poetical writer, he adopted, as in the tale of the Hermit
of Warkworth, a diction scarcely in any one of its features
distinguishable from the vague, the glossy, and unfeeling
language of his day. I mention this remarkable fact" with
regret, esteeming the genius of Dr. Percy in this kind of
writing superior to that of any other man by whom in mod-
ern times it has been cultivated. That even Burger (to whom
Klopstock gave, in my hearing, a commendation which he
denied to Goethe and Schiller, pronouncing him to be a
genuine poet, and one of the few among the Germans whose
works would last) had not the fine sensibility of Percy,
might be shown from many passages, in which he has de-
serted his original only to go astray. For example.
Now daye was gone, and niglit was come.
And all were fast aalecpe,
All save the Lady Erncline,
Who sate in her bowre to weepe :
And soone she heard her true Love's voice
Low whispering at Ihe walle,
Awake, awake, my dear Ladye,
'Tis 1 thy true-love call.
bich is thus tricked out and dilated;
Als nun die Nacht Gebirg" und Thai
Vermuramt in Rabcnschattcn,
Und Hocbburgs Lampen uberall
Schon ausge&immeTt hatten,
Und allea tief eotschlafen war;
Doch nur das Fraulein imnterdar.
Vol! Fiel)eran8St, noch wachte,
Und seinen Ritter dachte:
P'SheDMDae, in bis Schof>lm;aress . eivcs ■ still more
remarkable instance
Br this timidily. On \K fits! aPBrarancc (see D'Israeli
CartoJlIi" of Lilttal«rt) Itae Poem was aKompanied w
th an absurd prose
essiods in ite ten
imply, that the whole was intended for burle«jue. In
lubsequent editions,
the commentary was dropped, and (he People have sine
continued to read
in seriousnesi, doing for the Authoc what he had not
Gourace openly to
TmtDTe upon for himself.
I WILLIAJT WOBDSWORTH
Da horch 1 Ein suwer Uebcston
Kaai leis' eropor gcflogen.
* Ho. Tnidchen, ho I Da bin ich schon !
Frisch auf I Dicb anguogen 1 '
But from humble ballads we must ascend to heroics.
All hail, Macpherson! hail to thee. Sire of Ossian! The
Phantom was begotten by the snug embrace of an im-
pudent Highlander upon a cloud of tradition — it travelled
southward, where it was greeted with acclamation, and the
thin Consistence took its course through Europe, upon the
breath of popular applause. The Editor of the Reliques
had indirectly preferred a claim to the praise of in-
vention, by not concealing that his supplementary labours
were considerable! how selfish his conduct, contrasted with
that of the disinterested Gael, who, like L*ar, gives his
kingdom away, and is content to become a pensioner upon
his own issue for a beggarly pittance ! — Open this far-famed
Book I — I have done so at random, and the beginning of the
Epic Poem Tentora, in eight Books, presents itself. 'The
blue waves of UUin roll in fight. The green hills are covered
with day. Trees shake their dusky heads in the breeze.
Grey torrents pour their noisy streams. Two green hills
with aged oaks surround a narrow plain. The blue course
of a stream is there. On its banks stood Cairbar of Atha.
His spear supports the king; the red eyes of his fear are
aad. Cormac rises on his soul with all his ghastly wounds,'
Precious memorandums from the pocket-book of the blind
Ossian !
H it be unbecoming, as I acknowledge that for the most
part it is, to speak disrespectfully of Works that have en-
joyed for a length of time a widely-spread reputation, with-
out at the same time producing irrefragable proofs of their
imworthiness, let me be forgiven upon this occasion. — ^Hav-
ing had the good fortune to be bom and reared in a moun-
tainous country, from my very childhood I have felt the
falsehood that pervades the volumes imposed upon the world
under the name of Ossian. From what I saw witli my own
eyes, I knew that the imagery was spurious. In nature
everything is distinct, yet nothing defined into absolute in-
dependent singleness. In Macphecson'e work it is exactljj
SUPPLEMENTARY ESSAY (1815)
the reverse ; everything (that is not stolen) is in this manner
defined, insulated, dislocated, deadened, — yet nothing dis-
tinct. It will always be so when words are substituted for
things. To say that the characters never could exist, that
the manners are impossible, and that a dream has more sub-
stance than the whole state of society, as there depicted, is
doing nothing more than pronouncing a censure which Mac-
pherson defied; when, with the steeps of Morven before his
eyes, he could talk so familiarly of his Car-borne heroes;—
of Morven, which, if one may judge from its appearance at
the distance of a few miles, contains scarcely an acre of
ground sufficiently accommodating for a sledge to be trailed
along its surface, — Mr. Malcolm Laing has ably shown that
the diction of this pretended translation is a motley as-
semblage from all quarters; but he is so fond of making
out parallel passages as to call poor Macpherson to account
for his 'ands' and his 'buls!' and he has weakened his
argument by conducting it as if he thought that every strik-
ing resemblance was a conscious plagiarism. It is enough
that the coincidences are too remarkable for its being prob-
able or possible that they could arise in different minds
without communication between them. Now as the Trans-
lators of the Bible, and Shakespeare, Milton, and Pope,
could not be indebted to Macpherson, it follows that he
must have owed his fine feathers to them; unless we are
prepared gravely to assert, with Madame de Stael, that
many of the characteristic beauties of our most celebrated
English Poets are derived from the ancient Fingallian; in
which case the modern translator would have been but giv-
ing back to Ossian his own. — It is consistent that Lucien
Buonaparte, who could censure Milton for having sur-
rounded Satan in the infernal regions with courtly and regal
splendour, should pronounce the modem Ossian to be the
glory of Scotland; — a country that has produced a Dunbar,
a Buchanan, a Thomson, and a Burns ! These opinions are
of ill omen for the Epic ambition of him who has given
them to the world.
Yet, much as those pretended treasures of antiquity have
been admired, they have been wholly uninfluential upon the
literature of the Country. No succeeding writer appears to
918
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
have caught from them a ray of inspiratioa; no author, :
the least distinguished, has ventured formally to imitate
them — except the hoy, Chatterton, on their first appearance.
He had perceived, from the successful trials which he him-
self had made in literary forgery, how few critics were able
to distinguish between a real ancient medal and a counter-
feit of modem manufacture; and he set himself to the work
of filling a magazine with Sason Poems, — counterparts of
those of Ossian, as like his as one of his misty stars is to
another. This incapability to amalgamate with the literature
of the Island is, in my estimation, a decisive proof that the
bock is essentially unnatural ; nor should I require any other
to demonstrate it to be a forgery, audacious as worthless. —
Contrast, in this respect, the effect of Macpherson's publica-
tion with the Reliques of Percy, so unassuming, so modest
in their pretensions ! — I have already stated how much Ger-
many is indebted to this latter work ; and for our own coun-
try, its poetry has been absolutely redeemed by it. I do not
think that there is an able writer in verse of the present day
who would not be proud to acknowledge his obligations to
the Reliques; I know that it is so with my friends; and, for
myself, I am happy in this occasion to make a public avowal
of my own.
Dr. Johnson, more fortunate in his contempt of the labours
of Macpherson than those of his modest friend, was solicited
not long after to furnish Prefaces biographical and critical
for the works of some of the most eminent English Poets.
The booksellers took upon themselves to make the collec-
tion; they referred probably to the most popular miscellanies,
and, unquestionably, to their books of accounts ; and decided
upon the claim of authors to be admitted into a body of the
most eminent, from the familiarity of their names with the
readers of that day, and by the profits, which, from the sale
of his works, each had brought and was bringing to the
Trade, The Editor was allowed a limited exercise of dis-
cretion, and the Authors whom he recommended are
scarcely to be mentioned without a smile. We open the
volume of Prefatory Lives, and to our astonishment the
first name we find is thai of Cowley! — What is become of
the morning-star of English Poetry? Where is the bright
SUPPLEMENTARY ESSAY (181»>
347
Sizabethan constellation? Or, if names be more ac-
ceptable than images, where is the ever- to-be -honoured
Chaucer? where is Spenser? where Sidney? and, lastly,
where he, whose rights as a poet, contra-distinguished from
those which he is universally allowed to possess as a drama-
tist, we have vindicated, — where Shakespeare? — These, and
a multitude of others not unworthy to be placed near them,
their contemporaries and successors, we have not. But in
their stead, we have (could better be expected when prece-
dence was to be settled by an abstract of reputation at any
given period made, as in this case before us?) Roscommon,
and Stepney, and Phillips, and Walsh, and Smith, and Duke,
and King, and Spratt — Halifax, Granville, Sheffield, Con-
greve, Broome, and other reputed Magnates — metrical writ-
ers utterly worthless and useless, except for occasions like
the present, when their productions are referred to as evi-
dence what a small quantity of brain is necessary to procure
a considerable stock of admiration, provided the aspirant
will accommodate himself to the likings and fashions o£
his day.
As I do not mean to bring down this retrospect to our
own times, it may with propriety be closed at the era of this
distinguished event. From the literature of other ages and
countries, proofs equally cogent might have been adduced,
that the opinions announced in the former part of this
Essay are founded upon truth. It was not an agreeable
ofilce, nor a prudent undertaking, to declare them; but their
importance seemed to render it a duty. It may still be
asked, where lies the particular relation of what has been
said to these Volumes? — The question will be easily
answered by the discerning Reader who is old enough to
remember the taste that prevailed when some of these
poems were first published, seventeen years ago; who has .
also observed to what degree the poetry of this Island has
since that period been coloured by tbem; and who is further
aware of the unremitting hostility with which, upon some
principle or other, they have each and all been opposed. A
sketch of my own notion of the constitution of Fame has
been given; and, as far as concerns myself, I have cause to
be satisfied. The love, the admiration, the indifference, the
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
slight, the aversion, and even the contempt, with which these
Poems have been received, knowing, as I do, the source
within my own mind, from which they have proceeded, and
the labour and pains, which, when labour and pains ap-
peared needful, have been bestowed upon them, must all,
if I think consistently, be received as pledges and tokens,
bearing the same general impression, though widely dif-
ferent in value; — they are all proofs that for the present
lime I have not laboured in vain : and afford assurances,
more or less authentic, tliat the products of my industry
will endure.
If there be one conclusion more forcibly pressed upon
us than another by the review which has been given of the
fortunes and fate of poetical Works, it is this — that every
author, as far as he is great and at the same time original,
has had the task of creating the taste by which he is to
be enjoyed ; so has it been, so will it continue to be. This
remark was long since made to me by the philosophical
Friend for the separation of whose poems from my own
I have previously expressed my regret. The predecessors
of an original Genius of a high order will have smoothed
the way for all that he has in common with them ; — and
much he will have in common; but, for what is peculiarly
his own, he will be called upon to clear and often to shape
his own road; — he will be in the condition of Hannibal
among the Alps.
And where lies the real difficulty of creating that taste
by which a truly original poet is to be relished? Is it in
breaking the bonds of custom, in overcoming the prejudices
of false refinement, and displacing the aversions of in-
experience? Or, if he labour for an object which here and
elsewhere I have proposed to myself, does it consist in
divesting the reader of the pride that induces him to dwell
upon those points wherein tnen differ from each other, to
the exclusion of those in which all men are alike, or the
same; and in making him ashamed of the vanity that ren-
ders him insensible of the appropriate excellence which
civil arrangements, less unjust than might appear, and
Nature illimitable in her bounty, had conferred on men
who may stand below him io the scale of society? FinaltT-,
SUPPLEMENTARY ESSAT (19W)
its it lie in establishing that dominion over the spirits of
readers by which they are to be humbled and humanized, in
order that they may be purified and exalted?
If these ends are to be attained by the mere communi-
cation of knowledge, it does not lie here. — Taste, I would
remind the reader, like Imagination, is a word which has
been forced to extend its services tar beyond the point to
which philosophy would have confined them. It is a meta-
phor, taken from a passive sense of the human body, and
transferred to things which are in their essence not pas-
sive, — to intellectual acts and operations. The word. Imagi-
nation, has been overstrained, from impulses honourable
to mankind, to meet the demands of the faculty which is
perhaps the noblest of our nature. In the instance of
Taste, the process has been reversed; and from the preva-
lence of dispositions at once injurious and discreditable,
being no other than that selfishness which is the child of
apathy, — ^which, as Nations decline in productive and creative
power, makes them value themselves upon a presumed refine-
ment of judging. Poverty of language is the primary cause
of the use which we make of the word, Imagination ; but
the word. Taste, has been stretched to the sense which it
bears in modem Europe by habits of self-conceit, inducing
that inversion in the order of things whereby a passive
faculty is made paramount among the faculties conversant
with the fine arts. Proportion and congruity, the requisite
knowledge being supposed, are subjects upon which taste
may be trusted; it is competent to this office — for in its
intercourse with these the mind is passive, and is affected
painfully or pleasurably as by an instinct. But the pro-
found and the exquisite in feeling, the lofty and universal
in thought and imagination; or, in ordinary language, the
pathetic and the sublime; — are neither of them, accurately
speaking, objects of a faculty which, could ever without a
sinking in the spirit of Nations have been designated by
the metaphor Taste. And why? Because without the exer-
tion of a co-operating power in the mind of the reader,
there can be no adequate sympathy with either of these
emotions: without this auxiliary impulse, elevated Of pro-
found passion cannot exist
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
Passion, it must be observed, is derived from a word
I which signifies suffering; but the cQanexion which suffering
has with effort, with exertion, and action, is immediate and
separable. How strilcingly is this property of human
.ture exhibited by the fact that, in popular language, to
in a passion is to be angry 1 But,
To be moved, then, by a passion is to be excited, often to
external, and always to internal, effort ; whether for the con-
tinuance and strengthening of the passion, or for its supres-
sion, accordingly as the course which it takes may be painful
or pleasurable. If the latter, the soul must contribute to its
support, or it never becomes vivid, — and soon langmshes and
dies. And this brings us to the point. If every great poet
with whose writings men are familiar, in the highest exer-
cise of his genius, before he can be thoroughly enjoyed, has
to call forth and to communicate power, this service, in
a still greater degree, falls upon an original writer, at his
first appearance in the world.— -Of genius the only proof is,
the act of doing well what is worthy to be done, and what
was never done before; Of genius, in the fine arts, the only
infallible sign is the widening the sphere of human sen-
sibility, for the delight, honour, and benefit of human
nature. Genius is the introduction of a new element into
the intellectual universe: or, if that be not allowed, it
is the application of powers to objects on which they had
not before been exercised, or the employment of them in
such a manner as to produce effects hitherto unknown.
What is all this but an advance, or a conquest, made by the
soul of the poet? Is it to be supposed that the reader can
make progress of (his kind, like an Indian prince or general
— stretched on his palanquin, and borne by his slaves? No;
he is invigorated and inspirited by his leader, in order that
he may exert himself; for he cannot proceed in quiescence,
he cannot be carried like a dead weight. Therefore to
create taste is to call forth and bestow power, of which
knowledge is the effect; and there lies the true difficulty.
As the pathetic participates of an animal sensation, it
SUPPLEMENTARY ESSAY (19W1 Ml
j;ht seem — ^that, if the springs of this emotion were
genuine, all men, possessed of competent knowledge of
the facts and circumstances, would be instantaneously af-
fected. And, doubtless, in the works of every true poet
will be found passages of that species of excellence which
is proved by effects immediate and universal. But there
are emotions of the pathetic that are simple and direct, and
others — that are complex and revolutionary; some — to
which the heart yields with gentleness; others — against
which it struggles with pride; these varieties are infinite
as the combinations of circumstance and the constitutions
of character. Remember, also, that the medium through
which, in poetry, the heart is to be affjcted, is language;
a thing subject to endless fluctuations and arbitrary asso-
ciations. The genius of the poet melts these down for his
purpose; but they retain their shape and quality to him
who is not capable of exerting, within his own mind, a cor-
responding energy. There is also a meditative, as well as a
human, pathos; an enthusiastic, as well as an ordinary,
sorrow ; a sadness that has its seat in the depths of reason,
to which the mind cannot sink gently of itself — but to which
it must descend by treading the steps of thought And
for the sublime, — if we consider what are the cares that
occupy the passing day, and how remote is the practice and
the course of life from the sources of sublimity, in the
soul of Man, can it be wondered that there is little existing
preparation for a poet charged with a new mission to ex-
tend its kingdom, and to augment and spread its enjoy-
ments ?
Away, then, with the senseless iteration of the word
popular, applied to new works in poetry, as if there were
no test of excellence in this first of the fine arts but that
all men should run after its productions, as if urged by an
appetite, or constrained by a spell! — ^The qualities of writ-
ing best fitted for eager reception are either such as startle
the world into attention by their audacity and extravagance;
or they are chiefly of a superficial kind, lying upon the
surfaces of manners; or arising out of a selection and ar-
rangement of incidents, by which the mind is kept upon
the stretch of curiosity, and the fancy amused without the
trouble of thought. But in everything which is to send tlie
soul into herself, to be admonished of her weakness, or to
be made conscious of her power; — wherever life and nature
are described as operated upon by the creative or abstract-
ing virtue of the imagination; wherever the instinctive
wisdom of antiquity and her heroic passions uniting, in
the heart of the poet, with the meditative wisdom of later
ages, have produced that accord of sublimated humanity
which is at once a history of the remote past and a pro-
phetic enunciation of the remotest future, there, the poet
must reconcile himself for a season to few and scattered
hearers. — Grand thoughts (and Shakespeare must often
have sighed over this truth), as they are most naturally and
most fitly conceived in solitude, so can ihey not be brought
forth in the midst of plaudits without some violation of
their sanctity. Go to a silent exhibition of the productions
of the sister Art, and be convinced that the qualities which
dazzle at first sight, and kindle the admiration of flie
multitude, are essentially different from those by which per-
manent influence is secured. Let us not shrink from follow-
ing up these principles as far as they will carry us, and
conclude with observing — that there never has been a
period, and perhaps never will be, in which vicious poetry,
of some kind or other, has not excited more zealous admira-
tion, and been far more generally read, than good; but this
advantage attends the good, that the indwidual, as well as
the species, survives from age to age; whereas, of the de-
praved, though the species be immortal, the individual
quickly perishes; the object of present admiration vanishes,
being supplanted by some other as easily produced; which,
though no better, brings with it at least the irritation of
novelty, — with adaptation, more or less skilful, to the chang-
ing humours of the majorir/ of those who are most at
leisure to regard poetical works when they first solicit their
attention.
Is it the result of the who!?,
Writer, the judgement of the Pi
The thought is most injurious
brought against him, he world
:'iat, in the opinion of the
?ile is not to be respected?
and, could the charge be
repel it with indignatit
The People have already been justified, and their eulogium
w
SUPPLEMENTARY ESSAY (1816) 353
pronounced by implication, when it was said, above — that,
of good poetry, the individual, as well as the species, sur-
vives. And how does it survive but through the People?
What preserves it but their intellect and their wisdom?
Past and future, are the wings
On whose support, harmoniously conjojced,
Uoves the great Spirit of human knowledge
MS.
The voice that issues from this Spirit is that Vox Populi
which the Deity inspires. Foolish must he be who can
mistake for this a local acclamation, or a transitory out-
cry — transitory though it be for years, local though from
a Nation. Still more lamentable is his error who can
believe that there is anything of divine infallibility in the
clamour of that small though loud portion of the community,
ever governed by factitious influence, which, under the
name of the Public, passes itself, upon the unthinking, for
the People. Towards the Public, the Writer hopes that
he feels as much deference as it is entitled to: but to the
People, philosophically characterized, and to the embodied
spirit of their knowledge, so far as it exists and moves, at
the present, faithfully supported by its two wings, the
past and the future, his devout respect, hts reverence, is
due. He offers it willingly and readily; and, this done,
takes leave of his Readers, by assuring them — that, if he
were not persuaded that the contents of these Volumes,
and the Work to which they are subsidiary, evince some-
thing of the ' Vision and the Faculty divine ' ; and that, both
in words and things, they will operate in their degree, to
extend the domain of sensibility for the delight, the honour,
and the benefit of human nature, nothwith standing the many
happy hours which he has employed in their composition,
and the manifold comforts and enjoyments they have pro-
cured to him, he would not, if a wish could do it, save
them from immediate destruction ; — from becoming at this
lent, to the world, as a thing that had never been.
PREFACE TO CROMWELL
BY VICTOR HUGO.
THE drama contained in the following pages has noth-
ing to commend it to the attention or the good will
of the public* It has not, to attract the interest ol
political disputants, the advantage of the veto of the official
censorship, nor even, to win for it at the outset the literary
sympathy of men of taste, the honour of having been form-
ally rejected by an infallible reading committee.
It presents itself, therefore, to the public gaze, naked and
friendless, like the infirm man of the Gospel — solus, pauper,
nudus. - •<■'
Not without some hesitation, moreover, did the authof
determine to burden his drama with a preface. Such things
arc usually of very little interest to the reader. He inquires
concerning the talent of a writer rather than concerning Ids
point of view ; and in determining whether a work is good or
bad, it matters little to him upon what ideas it is based, or in
what sort of mind it germinated. One seldom inspects the,
cellars of a house after visiting its salons, and when
eats the fruit of a tree, one cares but little about its root.
On the other hand, notes and prefaces are sometimes a
convenient method of adding to the weight of a book, and
of magnifying, in appearance at least, the importance of S
work ; as a matter of tactics this is not dissimilar to that of'
the general who, to make his battle-front more imposing,
puts everything, even his baggage-trains, in the line. And
then, while critics fall foul of the preface and scholars oi
the notes, it may happen that the work itself will escape
them, passing uninjured between their cross-fires, as an am^'
extricates itself from a dangerous position between two
skirmishes of outposts and rear -guards.
(iBoa-iSSj) t
d ^e lilenrf wotid
rld'i^'^tiu ti
TO CROMWEIX 3SS
' These reasons, weighty as they may seem, are not those
Which influenced the author. This volume did not need to
be inHaled, it was already too stout by far. Furthermore,
and the author does not know why it is so, his prefaces,
frank and ingenuous as they are, have always served rather
to compromise him with the critics than to shield him. Far
from being staunch and trusty bucklers, they have played
him a trick like that played in a battle by an unusual and
conspicuous uniform, which, calling attention to the soldier
who wears it, attracts all the blows and is proof against
none.
Considerations of an altogether different sort acted upon
the author. It seemed to him that, alihough in fact, one sel-
dom inspects the cellars of a building for pleasure, one is
not sorry sometimes to examine its foundations. He will,
therefore, give himself over once more, with a preface, to
the wrath of the feuillelonists. Che sara, sara. He has
never given much thought to the fortune of his works, and
he is but little appalled by dread of the literary what will
people say. In the discussion now raging, in which the
theatre and the schools, the public and the academies, are
at daggers drawn, one will hear, perhaps, not without some
interest, the voice of a solitary apprentice of nature and
truth, who has withdrawn betimes from the literary world,
for pure love of letters, and who offers good faith iii default
of good taste, sincere conviction in default of talent, study
in default of learning.
He will conhne himself, however, to general considerations
concerning the art, without the slightest attempt to smooth
the path of his own work, without pretending to write an
indictment or a plea, against or for any person whomsoever.
An attack upon or defence of his book is of less importance
to him than to anybody else. Nor is personal controversy
agreeable to him. It is always a pitiful spectacle to see two
hostile self-esteems crossing swords. He protests, therefore,
beforehand against every interpretation of his ideas, every
personal application of his words, saying with the Spanish
ifrblist;—
156 VICTOR HUGO
In truth, several of the leading champions of "sound
literary doctrines" have done him the honour to throw
the gauntlet to him, even in his profound obscurity —
to him, a simple, imperceptible spectator of this curious
contest. He will not have the presumption to pick it up.
In the following pages will be found the observations
with which he might oppose them — there will be found
his sling and his stone; but others, if they choose, may
hurl them at the head of the classical Goliaths,
This said, let us pass on.
J, Let us set out from a fact. The same type of civiliza-
tion, or to use a more exact, although more extended ex-
pression, the same society, has not always inhabited the
earth. The human race as a whole has grown, has de-
veloped, has matured, like one of ourselves. It was once
a child, it was once a man ; we are now looking on at
its impressive old age. Before the epoch which modern
society has dubbed "ancient," there was another epoch
which the ancients called " fabulous," but which it would
be more accurate to call " primitive." Behold then three
great successive orders of things in civilization, from its
origin down to our days. Now, as poetry is always super-
posed upon society, we propose to try to demonstrate,
from the form o£ its society, what the character of the
poetry must have been in those three great ages of the
world — primitive times, ancient times, modem times.
In primitive times, when man awakes in a world that
is newly created, poetry awakes with hira. In the face
of the marvellous things that dazzle and intoxicate him,
his first speech is a hymn simply. He is stilt so close to
God that all his meditations are ecstatic, all his dreams
are visions. His bosom swells, he sings as he breathes.
His lyre has but three strings — God, the soul, creation;
but this threefold mystery envelopes everything, this three-
fold idea embraces everything. The earth is still almost
deserted. There are families, but no nations ; patriarchs,
but no kings. Each race exists at its own pleasure; no
property, no laws, no contentions, no wars. Everything
belongs to each and to all. Society is a community. Man
is restrained in nought He leads that nomadic pastoral
TO CROMWELL 3S7
life with which all civilizations begin, and which is so well
adapted to solitary contemplation, to fanciful reverie. He
follows every suggestion, he goes hither and thither, at
random. His thought, like his life, resembles a cloud that
changes its shape and its direction according to the wind
that drives it. Such is the first man, such is the first
poet. He is young, he is cynical. Prayer is his sole re-
ligion, the ode is his only form of poetry.
This ode, this poem of primitive times, is Genesis.
By slow degrees, however, this youth of the world passes
away. All the spheres progress; the family becomes a
tribe, the tribe becomes a nation. Each of these groups
of men camps about a common centre, and kingdoms ap-
pear. The social instinct succeeds the nomadic instinct.
The camp gives place to the city, the tent to the palace,
the ark to the temple. The chiefs of these nascent states
are still shepherds, it is true, but shepherds of nations ;
the pastoral staff has already assumed the shape of a
sceptre. Everything tends to become stationary and fixed.
Religion takes on a definite shape ; prayer is governed by
rites ; dogma sets bounds to worship. Thus the priest
and king share the paternity of the people; thus theocratic
society succeeds the patriarchal community.
Meanwhile the nations are beginning to be packed too
closely on the earth's surface. They annoy and jostte one
another; hence the clash of empires — war. They over-
flow upon another ; hence, the migrations of nations —
voyages. Poetry reflects these momentous events; from
ideas it proceeds to things. It sings of ages, of nations,
of empires. It becomes epic, it gives birth to Homer,
Homer, in truth, dominates the society of ancient times.
In that society, all is simple, all is epic. Poetry ts re-
ligion, religion is law. The virginity of the earlier age
is succeeded by the chastity of the later. A sort of sol-
emn gravity is everywhere noticeable, in private manners
no less than in public. The nations have retained nothing
of the wandering hfe of the earlier time, save respect for
the stranger and the traveller. The family has a father-
land; everything is connected therewith; it has the cult
— of the house and the cult of the tomb.
358 VICTOR HUGO
We say again, such a civiliiation can find its one ex-
pression only in the epic. The epic will assume diverse
forms, but will never lose its specific character. Pindar
is more priestlike than patriarchal, more epic than lyricaL
If the chroniclers, the necessary accompanitneDts of this
second age of the world, set about collecting traditions
and begin to reckon by centuries, they labour to no purpose
— chronology cannot expel poesy; history remains an epic
Herodotus is a Homer.
But it is in the ancient tragedy, above all, that the
epic breaks out at every turn. It mounts the Greek stage
without losing aught, so to speak, of its immeasurable*
gigantic proportions. Its characters are still heroes, demi-
gods, gods; its themes are visions, oracles, fatality; its
scenes are battles, funeral rites, catalogues. That which
the rhapsodists formerly sang, the actors declaim — that
is the whole difference.
There is something more. When the whole plot, the
whole spectacle of the epic poem have passed to the stage,
the Chorus takes all that remains. The Chorus annotates
the tragedy, encourages the heroes, gives descriptions,
summons and expels the daylight, rejoices, laments, some-
times furnishes the scenery, explains the moral bearing
of the subject, flatters the listening assemblage. Now, what
is the Chorus, this anomalous character standing between
the spectacle and the spectator, if it be not the poet com-
pleting his epic?
The theatre of the ancients is, like their dramas, huge,
ponti5cal, epic. It is capable of holding thirty thousand
spectators ; the plays arc given in the open air, in bright
sunlight; the performances last all day. The actors dis-
guise their voices, wear masks, increase their stature; they
make themselves gigantic, like their roles. The stage ia
immense. It may represent at the same moment botli thej
interior and the exterior of a temple, a palace, a camp, a'
city. Upon it, vast spectacles are displayed. There !■ <
— ^we cite only from memory — Prometheus on his moun-
tain; there is Antigone, at the lop of a tower, seeking
her brother Polynices in the hostile army (The Phtxn^
citmt); there is Evadne hurling herself from a cli£E into
TO GROMWZLL 390
the flames where the body of Capaneus is burning (The
Suppliants of Euripides) ; there is a ship sailing into port
and landing fifty princesses with their retinues (The Sttp-
pliants of ^schylus). Architecture, poetry, everything as-
sumes a monumental character. In all antiquity there is noth-
ing more solemn, more majestic. Its history and its religion
are mingled on its stage. Its first actors are priests; its scenic
performances are religious ceremonies, national festivals.
One last observation, which completes our demonstra.
tion of the epic character of this epoch: in the subjects
which it treats, no less than in the forms it adopts,
tragedy simply re-echoes the epic. All the ancient tragic
authors derive their plots from Homer. The same fabulous
exploits, the same catastrophes, the same heroes. One and
all drink from the Homeric stream. The Iliad and Odyssey
are always in evidence. Like Achilles dragging Hector at
his chariot- wheel, the Greek tragedy circles about Troy,
But the age of the epic draws near its end. Like the
society that it represents, this form of poetry wears itself
out revolving upon itself. Rome reproduces Greece, Virgil
copies Homer, and, as if to make a becoming end, epic
poetry expires in the last parturition.
It was time. Another era is about to begin, for the
world and for poetry,
A spiritual religion, supplanting the materia! and ex-
ternal paganisn^ makes its way to the heart of the an-
cient society, kills it, and deposits, in that corpse of a
decrepit civilization, the germ of modern civilization. Thia
religion is complete, because it is true; between its dogma
and its cult, it embraces a deep-rooted moral. And first
of all, as a fundamental truth, it teaches man that he
has two lives to live, one ephemeral, the other immortal;
one on earth, the other in heaven. It shows him that
he, like his destiny, is twofold: that there is in him an
animal and an intellect, a body and a soul; in a word,
that he is the point of intersection, the common link of
the two chains of 'bsings which embrace all creation —
of tht' 'chain of m»t<wial beings and the chain of in-
corporeal beings; the first starting from the rock to arrive
t man, the second starting from man to end at God.
MO VICTOR HUGO
A portion of these truths had perhaps been suspected
by certain wise men of ancient times, but their full, broad,
luminous revelation dates from the Gospels, The pagan
schools walked in darkness, feeling their way, clinging to
falsehoods as well as to truths in their haphazard jour-
neying. Some of their philosophers occasionally cast upon
certain subjects feeble gleams which illuminated but one
side and made the darkness of the other side more profound.
Hence all the phantoms created by ancient philosophy.
None but divine wisdom was capable of substituting
even and all-embracing light for all those 8ickeririg rays
of human wisdom. Pythagoras, Epicurus, Socrates, Flato,
are torches: Christ is the glorious light of day.
Nothing could be more material, indeed, than the ancient
theogony. Far from proposing, as Christianity does, to
separate the spirit from the body, it ascribes form and
features to everything, even to impalpable essences, even
to the intelligence. In it everything is visible, tangible,
fleshly. Its gods need a cloud to conceal themselves from
men's eyes. They eat, drink, and sleep. They are wounded
and their blood flows; they are maimed, and lo! they limp
forever after. That religion has gods and halves of gods.
Its thunderbolts are forged on an anvil, and among other
things three rays of twisted rain (tres imbris torii radios')
enter into their composition. Its Jupiter suspends the
world by a golden chain ; its sun rides in a four-horse
chariot: its hell is a precipice the brink of which is marked
on the globe; its heaven is a mountain.
Thus paganism, which moulded all creations from the
same clay, minimizes divinity and magnifies man. Homei
heroes are of almost the same stature as his gods. Ajax
defies Jupiter, Achilles is the peer of Mars. Christianity
on the contrary, as we have seen, draws a broad line of
division between spirit and matter. It places an abyss
between the soul and the body, an abyss between man and
God.
At this point — to omit nothing from the sketch upon
which we have ventured — we will call attention to the
fact that, with Christianity, and by its means, there en-
tered into the mind of the nations a new seatimeatj im-
TO CROMWELL
361
known to the ancients and marvellously developed among
moderns, a sentiment which is more than gravity and less
than sadness — melancholy. In truth, might not the heart
of man, hitherto deadened by religions purely hierarchical
and sacerdotal, awake and fee! springing to life within
it some unexpected faculty, under the breath of a religion
that is human because it is divine, a religion which makes
of the poor man's prayer, the rich man's wealth, a religion
of equality, liberty and charity? Might it not see all things
in 3 new light, since the Gospel had shown it the soul
through the senses, eternity behind life?
Moreover, at Ihat very moment the world was under-
' going so complete a revolution that it was impossible that
there should not be a revolution in men's minds. Hitherto
the catastrophes of empires had rarely reached the hearts
of the people; it was kings who fell, majesties that vanished,
nothing more. The lightning struck only in the upper
regions, and, as we have already pointed out, events seemed
to succeed one another with all the solemnity of the epic.
In the ancient society, the individual occupied so lowly
a place that, to strike him, adversity must needs descend to
his family. So that he knew little of misfortune outside of
domestic sorrows. It was an almost unheard-of thing that
the general disasters of the stale should disarrange his life.
But the instant that Christian society became firmly estab-
lished, the ancient continent was thrown into confusion.
Everything was pulled up by the roots. Events, destined to
destroy ancient Europe and to construct a new Europe,
trod upon one another's heels in their ceaseless rush, and
drove the nations pell-mell, some into the light, others
into darkness. So much uproar ensued that it was im-
possible that some echoes of it should not reach the hearts
of the people. It was more than an echo, it was a reflex
blow. Man, wifhdrawing within himself in presence of
these imposing vicissitudes, began to take pity upon man-
kind, to reflect upon the bitter disillusion men ts of life.
Of this sentiment, which to Cato the heathen was despair,
Christianity fashioned melancholy.
At the same time was born the spirit of scrutiny and
curiosity. These great cataAtro^bes were also great spec*
VICTOR HtJGO
tacles, impressive cataclysms. It was the North hurling
itself upon the South; the Roman world changing shape;
the last convulsive throes of a whole universe in the
death agony. As soon as that world was dead, lot clouds
of rhetoricians, grammarians, sophists, swooped down like
insects on its immense body. People saw them swarming
and heard them buzzing in that seat of putrefaction. They
vied with one another in scrutinizing, commenting, dis-
puting. Each limb, each muscle, each Sbrc of the huge
prostrate body was twisted and turned in every direction.
Surely it must have been a keen satisfaction to those
anatomists of the mind, to be able, at their debut, to make
experiments on a large scale; to have a dead society to
dissect, for their first "subject."
Thus we see melancholy and meditation, the demons
of analysis and controversy, appear at the same moment,
and, as it were, hand-in-hand. At one extremity of this
era of transition is Longinus, at the other St Augustine,
We must beware of casting a disdainful eye upon that
epoch wherein all that has since borne fruit was con-
tained in germs; upon that epoch whose least eminent
writers, if we may be pardoned a vulgar but expressive
phrase, made fertilizer for the harvest that was to fol-
low. The Middle Ages were grafted on the Lower Empire.
Behold, then, a new religion, a new society; upon this
twofold foundation there must inevitably spring up a
new poetry. Previously — we beg pardon for setting forth
a result which the reader has probably already foreseen
from what has been said above — previously, following
therein the course pursued by the ancient polytheism and
philosophy, the purely epic muse of the ancients had studied
nature in only a single aspect, casting aside without
pity almost everything in art which, in the world
subjected to its imitation, had not relation to a certain
type of beauty. A type which vras magnificent at first,
but, as always happens with everything systematic, became
in later times false, trivial and conventional. Christianity
leads poetry to the truth. Like it, the modern muse will
see things in a higher and broader light. It will realize
that everything in creation is not humanly btcmtiftd, that
TO CROMWELL SBS
the ugl; exists beside the beautiful, the unshapely beside
the graceful, the grotesque on the reverse of tfie sublime,
evil with good, darkness with light. It will ask itself if
the narrow and relative sense of the artist should prevail
over the infinite, absolute sense of the Creator; if it is for
man to correct God; if a mutilated nature will be the
more beautiful for the mutilation; if art has the right
to duplicate, so to speak, man, life, creation; if things
will progress better when their muscles and their vigour
have been taken from them; if, in short, to be incomplete
is the best way to be harmonious. Then it is that, with
its eyes fixed upon events that are both laughable and
redoubtable, and under the influence of that spirit of
Christian melancholy and philosophical criticism which we
described a moment ago, poetry will take a great step!
a decisive step, a step which, like the upheaval of an earthj
quake, will change the whole face of the intellectual world
It will set about doing as nature does, mingling in its crea-
tions — but without confounding them — darkness and light,
the grotesque and the sublime; in other words, the body
and the soul, the beast and the intellect; for the starting-
point of religion is always the starting-point of poetry. All
things are connected.
Thus, then, we see a principle unknown to the ancients,
a new type, introduced in poetry; and as an additional
element in anything modifies the whole of the thing, a new
form of the art is developed. This type is the grotesque;
its new form is comedy.
And we beg leave to dwell upon this point; for we have
now indicated the significant feature, the fundamental dif-
ference which, in our opinion, separates modern from an-
cient art, the present form from the defunct form; or,
to use less definite but more popular terms, romantic htera-
ture from classical literature,
" At last ! " exclaim the people who for some time past
have seen what we were coming al, " at last we have you —
you are caught in the act. So then you put forward the
agly as a type for imitation, you make the grotesque an
element of art. But the graces ; but good taste 1 Don't
you luiow that art should correct nature? that we nuut
VICTOR HUGO
ennoble art? that we must seltcif Did the ancieots ever
exhibit the ugly or the grotesque? Did they ever mingle
comedy and tragedy ? The example of the ancients, gen-
tlemen I And Aristotle, too ; and Boiteau ; and La Harpe.
Upon my word ! "
These arguments are sound, doubtless, and, above all, of
extraordinary novelty. But it is not our place to reply
to them. We are constructing no system here — God protect
us from systems ! We are stating a (act. We are a his-
torian, not a critic. Whether the fact is agreeable or not
matters little; it is a fact. Let us resume, therefore, and
toy to prove that it is of the fruitful union of the grotesque
And the sublime types that modem genius is bom — so com-
plex, so diverse in its forms, so inexhaustible in its creations;
and therein directly opposed to the uniform simplicity of the
genius of the ancients; let us show that that is the point
from which we must set out to establish the real and radical
difference between the two forms of literature.
Not that it is strictly true that comedy and the gro-
tesque were entirely unknown to the ancients. In fact,
such a thing would be impossible. Nothing grows without
a root; the germ of the second epoch always exists in the
first- In the Iliad Thersites and Vulcan furnish comedy,
one to the mortals, the other to tlie gods. There is too
much nature and originality in the Greek tragedy for there
not to be an occasional touch of comedy in it. For ex-
ample, to cite only what we happen to recall, the scene
between Menelaus and the portress of the palace, (Helen,
Act I), and the scene of the Phrygian {Orestes, Act IV).
The Tritons, the Satyrs, the Cyclops are grotesque; Poly-
phemus is a terrifying, Silenus a farcical grotesque.
But one feels that this part of the art is still in its in-
fancy. The epic, which at this period imposes its form
on everything, the epic weighs heavily upon it and stifles
it. The ancient grotesque is timid and forever trying to
keep out of sight. It is plain that it is not on familiar
ground, because it is not in its natural surroundings. It
conceals itself as much as it can. The Satyrs, the Tritoms,
and the Sirens are hardly abnormal in form. The Fates
and the Harpies are hideous in their attributes rather
than in feature; the Furies are beautiful, and are called
Eutnenides, that is to say, gentle, beneficent. There is a
veil of grandeur or of divinity over other grotesques.
Polyphemus is a giant, Midas a king, Silenus a god.
Thus comedy is almost imperceptible in the great epic
ensemble of ancient times. What is the barrow of Thespis
beside the Olympian chariots? What are Aristophanes and
Plautus, beside the Homeric colossi, yEschylus, Sophocles,
Euripides? Homer bears them along with him, as Hercules
bore the pygmies, hidden in his lion's skin !
In the idea of men of modern times, however, the gro-
tesque plays an enormous part. It is found everywhere;
on the one hand it creates the abnormal and the horrible,
on the other the comic and the burlesque. It fastens upon
religion a thousand original superstitions, upon poetry a
thousand picturesque fancies. It is the grotesque which
scatters lavishly, in air, water, earth, fire, those myriads
of intermediary creatures which we find all alive in the
popular traditions of the Middle Ages; it is the grotesque
which impels the ghastly antics of the witches' revels,
which gives Satan his horns, his cloven foot and his bat's
wings. It is the grotesque, still the grotesque, which now
casts into the Christian hell the frightful faces which the
severe genius of Dante and Milton will evoke, and again
peoples it with those laughter-moving figures amid which
Callot, the burlesque Michelangelo, will disport himself. If
it passes from ihe world of imagination to the real world, it
unfolds an inexhaustible supply of parodies of mankind.
Creations of its fantasy are the Scaramouches, Crispins and
Harlequins, grinning silhouettes of man, types altogether
unknown to serious- minded antiquity, although they origi-
nated in classic Italy. It is the grotesque, lastly, which,
colouring the same drama with the fancies of the North and
of the South in turn, exhibits Sganarelle capering about Don.
Juan and Mephistopheles crawling about Faust
And how free and open it is in its bearing I how boldly
it brings into relief all the strange forms which the pre-
ceding age had timidly wrapped in swaddling-clothes I
Ancient poetry, compelled to provide the lame Vulcan with
companions, tried to disguise tiieir deformity by distributing
VICTOR nroo
it, so to speak, upon gigantic proportions. Modern genms re-
tains this myth of the supernatural smiths, but gives it an
entirely different character and one which makes it e^'eo
more striking; it changes the giants to dwarfs aad makes
gnomes of the Cyclops. With like originality, it nibstitutes
for the somewhat commonplace Leriuean hydra all the local
dragons of our nationel legends — the gargoyle of Rouen, the
gra-ouilli of Metz, the chair salUe of Troyes, the drie of
Montihery, the tarasque of Tarascon — monsters of forms so
diverse, whose outlandish names are an additional attribute.
All these creations draw from their own nature that ener-
getic and significant expression before which antiquity seems
aometimes to have recoiled. Certain it is that the Greek
Eumenides are much less horrible, and consequently less
true, than the witches in Macbeth. Pluto is not the deviL
In our opinion a most novel book might be written upoti
the employment of the grotesque in the arts. One might
point out the powerful effects the moderns have obtained
from that fruitful type, upon which narrow-minded criticism
continues to wage war even in our own day. It may be
that we shall be led by our subject to call attention in passing
to some features of this vast picture. We will simply say
here that, as a means of contrast with the sublime, the
grotesque is, in our view, the richest source that nature can
offer art Rubens so understood it, doubtless, when it
pleased him to introduce the hideous features of a court
dwarf amid his exhibitions of royal magnificence, coronations
and splendid ceremonial. The universal beauty which the
ancients solemnly laid upon everything, is not without
monotony; the same impression repeated again and again
may prove fatiguing at last. Sublime upon sublime scarcely
presents a contrast, and we need a little rest from every-
thing, even the beautiful. On the other hand, the grotesque
seems to be a halting- pi ace, a mean term, a starting-point
whence one rises toward the beautiful with a fresher and
keener perception. The salamander gives relief to the
water- sprite ; the gnome heightens the charm of the sylph.
And it would be true also to say that contact with the
abnormal has imparted to the modem sublime a something
purer, grander, more sublime, in short, than the beautiful of
TO CEOMWELL
the ancients; and that is as it should be. When art is con-
sistent with itself, it guides everything more surely to its
goal. If the Homeric Elysium is a long, long way from the
ethereal charm, the angelic pleasures.bleness of Milton's Par-
adise, it is because under Eden there Js a hell far more ter-
rible than the heathen Tartarus. Do you think that Francesca
da Rimini and Beatrice would be so enchanting in a poet
who should not confine us in the Tower ot' Hunger and com-
pel us to share Ugolino's revolting repast? Dante would
have les; charm, if he had less power. Have the fleshly
naiads, the musctUar Tritons, the wanton Zephyrs, the
diaphanous transparency of our water-sprites and sylphs? Is
it not because the modem imagination does not fear to
picture the ghastly forms of vampires, ogres, ghouls, snake-
charmers and jinns prowling about graveyards, that it can
give to its fairies that incorporeal shape, that purity of
essence, of which the heathen nymphs fall so far short? The
antique Venus is beautiful, admirable, no doubt ; but what has
imparted to Jean Goujon's faces that weird, tender, ethereal
delicacy ? What has given them that unfamiliar suggestion
of life and grandeur, if not the proximity of the rough and
powerful sculptures of the Middle Ages?
If the thread of our argument has not been broken in the
reader's mind by these necessary digressions — which in truth,
might be developed much further— he has realized, doubtless,
how powerfully the grotesque — that germ of comedy, fostered
by the modern muse — grew in extent and importance as soon
as it was transplanted to a soil more propitious than pagan-
ism and the Epic. In truth, in the new poetry, while the
Gublime represents the soul as it is, purified by Christian
morality, the grotesque plays the part of the human beasL
The former type, delivered of all impure alloy, has as its
attributes all the charms, all the graces, all the heauties; it
must be able some day to create Juliet, Desdemona, Ophelia.
The latter assumes all the absurdities, all the infirmities, all
the blemishes. In this partition of mankind and of creation,
to it fall the passions, vices, crimes; it is sensuous, fawning,
greedy, miserly, false, incoherent, hypocritical ; it is, in turn,
lago, Tartuffe, Basile, Polcnius, Harpagon, Bartholo, Falstaflt,
Scapin, Figaro. The beautiful has but one type, the uglj;
VICTOR HUGO
has a thousand. The fact is that the beautiful, htmahly
Epeaking, is merely form considered in its simplest aspect, in
its most perfect symmetry, in its most entire harmony with
our make-up. Thus the ensemble that it offers us is always
complete, but restricted Hkc ourselves. What we call the
ugly, on the contrary, is a detail of a great whole which
eludes us, and which is in harmony, not with man but with
all creation. That is why jt constantly presents itself to
us in new but incomplete aspects.
It is interesting to study the first appearance and the
progress of the grotesque in modern times. At first, it is
an invasion, an irruption, an overflow, as of a torrent that
has burst its banks. It rushes through the expiring Latin
literature, imparts some coloring to Persius, Petronius and
Juvenal, and leaves behind it the Golden Ass of Apuleius.
Thence it diffuses itself through the imaginations of the
new nations that are remodelling Europe. It abounds in
the work of the fabulists, the chroniclers, the romancists.
We see it make its way from the South to the North. It
disports itself in the dreams of the Teutonic nations, and at
the same time vivifies with its breath the admirable Spanish
romanceros, a veritable Iliad of the age of chivalry. For
example, it is the grotesque which describes thus, in the
Roman de la Rose, an august ceremonial, the election of a
More especially it imposes its characteristic qualities upon
that wonderful architecture which, in the Middle Ages,
takes the place of all the arts. It atSxes its mark on the
facades of cathedrals, frames its hells and purgatories in
the ogive arches of great doorways, portrays them in brilliant
hues on window-glass, exhibits its monsters, its bull-dogs, its
imps about capitals, along friezes, on the edges of roofs.
It flaunts itself in numberless shapes on the wooden facades
of houses, on the stone facades of chateaux, on the marble
faqides of palaces. From the arts it makes its way into the
national manners, and while it stirs applause from the people
for the graciosos of comedy, it gives to the kings court-jest-
ers, i-afer, in the age of etiquette, it will show us Scarron on
TO CROMWELL 369
e v«y edge of Louis the Fourteenth's bed. Meanwhile, it
decorates coats-of-arms, and draws upon knights' shields the
symbolic hieroglyphs of feudalism, From the manners, it
makes its way into the laws ; numberless strange customs at-
test its passage through the institutions of the Middle Ages,
Just as it represented Thespis, smeared with wine-lees, leap-
ing in her tomb, it dances with the Basoche on the famous
marble table which served at the same time as a stage for
the popular farces and for the royal banquets. Finally,
having made its way into the arts, the manners, and the laws,
it enters even the Church. In every Catholic city we see it
organizing some one of those curious ceremonies, those
strange processions, wherein religion is attended by 211
varieties of superstition — the sublime attended by all the
forms of the grotesque. To paint it in one stroke, so great
is its vigour, its energy, its creative sap, at the dawn of
letters, that it casts, at the outset, upon the threshold of
modem poetry, three burlesque Homers: Ariosto in Italy,
Cervantes in Spain, Rabelais in France.
It would be mere surplusage to dwell further upon the
influence of the grotesque in the third civilization. Every-
thing tends to show its dose creative alliance with the
beautiful in the so-called "romantic" period. Even among
the simplest popular legends there are none which do not
somewhere, witii an admirable instinct, solve this mystery
of modern art Antiquity could not have produced Beauty
and the Beast,
It is true that at the period at which we have arrived
the predominance of the grotesque over the sublime in lit-
erature is clearly indicated. But it is a spasm of reaction,
an eager thirst for novelty, which is but temporary; it is
an initial wave which gradually recedes. The type of the
beautiful will soon resume its rights and its role, which is
not to exclude the other principle, but to prevail over iL
It is time that the grotesque should be content with a corner
of the picture in Murillo's royal frescoes, in the sacred
pages of Veronese; content to be introduced in two mar-
vellous Last Judgments, in which art will take a just pride,
in the scene of fascination and horror with which Michel-
angelo will embellish the Vatican; in those awe-inspiring rep-
VICTOR HUOO 1
resentations of the fall of man which Rubens will du-ow
npon the arches of the Cathedral of Antwerp. The time
has come when the balance between the two principfes is to
be established. A man, a poet-king, poeta soverano, as Dante
calls Homer, is about to adjust everything. The cwo rival
genii combine their flames, and thence issues Shakespeare.
We have now reached the poetic culmination of modem
times. Shakespeare is the drama ; and the drama, which
with the same breath moulds the grotesque and the sublime,
the terrible and the absurd, tragedy and comedy — the drama
is the distinguishing characteristic of the third epoch of
poetry, of the literature of the present day.
Thus, to sum up hurriedly the facts that we have noted
thus far, poetry has three periods, each of which corresponds
to an epoch of civilization: the ode, the epic, and the drama.
Primitive times are lyrical, ancient times epical, modem
, times dramatic. The ode sings of eternity, the epic impatts
. solemnity to history, the drama depicts life. The character-
istic of the first poetry is ingenuousness, of the second, sim-
plicity, of the third, truth. The rhapsodists mark the transi-
tion from the lyric to th? epic poets, as do the romancists
that from the lyria'tfitfie dramatic poets. Historians appear
in the second period, chroniclers and critics in the third.
The characters of the ode are colossi — Adam, Cain, Noah;
those of the epic are giants — Achilles, Atreus, Orestes; those
of the drama are men— Hamlet, Macbeth, Othello. The ode
lives upon the ideal, the epic upon the grandiose, the drama
upon the real. Lastly, this threefold poetry flows from three
great sources — The Bible, Homer, Shakespeare.
Such then — and we confine ourselves herein to noting a
single result — such are the diverse aspects of thought in
the different epochs of mankind and of civilization. Such are
its three faces, in youth, in manhood, in old age. Whether
one examines one literature by itself or all literatures e»
masse, one will always reach the same result: the lyric
poets before the epic poets, the epic poets before the dra-
matic poets. In France, Malberbe before Chapelain. Chape-
lain before Corneille; in ancient Greece, Orpheus before
Homer, Homer before ^schylus; in the first of all books,
Cenetis before Kings, Kings before Job; or to come back
TO CROMWELL 371
i that monumental scale of all ages of poetry, which we
"tva over a moment since, The Bible before the Iliad, the
Iliad before Shakespeare.
In a word, civilization begins by singing of its dreams,
then narrates its doings, and, lastly, sets about describing
what it thinks. It is, let us say in passing, because of
this last, that the drama, combining the most opposed
qualities, may be at the same time full of profundity and
full of relief, philosophical and picturesque.
It would be logical to add here that everything in nature
and in life passes through these three phases, the lyric, the
epic, and the dramatic, because everything is born, acts,
and dies. If it were not absurd to confound the fantastic
conceits of the imagination with the stern deductions of the
reasoning faculty, a poet might say that the rising of the
sun, for example, is a hymn, noon-day a brilliant epic, and
sunset B gloomy drama wherein day and night, life and
death, contend for mastery. But that would be poetry —
folly, perhaps — and arhat does it proveT
Let us hold to the facts marshalled above; let us sup-
plement them, too, by an important observation, namely
that we have in no wise pretended to assign exclusive lim-
its to the three epochs of poetry, but simply to set forth
their predominant characteristics. The Bible, that divine
lyric monument, contains in germ, as we suggested a mo-
jnent ago, an epic and a drama — Kings and Job. In the
Homeric poems one is conscious of a clinging reminiscence
of lyric poetry and of a beginning of dramatic poetry.
Ode and drama meet in the epic There is a touch of all
in each; but in each there exists a generative element to
which all the other elements give place, and which imposes
its own character upon the whole.
The drama is complete poetry. The ode and the epic
contain it only in germ ; it contains both of them in a state of
high development, and epitomizes both. Surely, he who
said: "The French have not the epic brain," said a true
and clever thing; if he had said, "The modems," the clever
remark would have been profound. It is beyond question,
however, that there is epic genius in that marvellous Atkalie,
to exalted and so simple in its sublimity that the royal centui?
3ff VICTOR HUGO
was unable to comprehend it It is certain, too, tbat Ox
series of Shakespeare's chronicle dramas presents a. grand
epic aspect. But it is lyric poetry above all that befits the
drama; it aever embarrasses it, adapts itself to all its caprices,
disports itself in all forms, sometimes sublime as in Arid,
sometimes grotesque as in Caliban. Our era bein; above all
else dramatic, is for that very reason eminently l/ric. There
is more than one connection between the beginning and the
end; the sunset has some features of the sunrise; the old man
becomes a child once more. But this second childhood is
not like the first ; it is as melancholy as the other is Joyous.
It is the same with lyric poetry. Dazzling, dreamy, at the
dawn of civilization, it reappears, solemn and pensive, at its
decline. The Bible opens joyously with Genesis and comes
to a close with the threatening Apocalypse. The modem ode
is still inspired, but is no longer ignorant It meditates
more than it scrutinizes ; its musing is melancholy. We see,
by its painful labour, that the muse has taken the drama
for her mate.
To make clear by a metaphor the ideas that we have ven-
tured to put forth, we will compare early lyric poetry to a
placid lake which reflects the clouds and stars ; the epic is
the stream which flows from the lake, and rushes on, re-
flecting its banks, forests, fields and cities, until it throws
itself into the ocean of the drama. Like the lake, the drama
reflects the sky; like the stream, it reflects its banks; but
it alone has tempests and measureless depths.
The drama, then, is the goal to which everything in
modern poetry leads. Paradise Lost is a drama before it is
an epic. As we know, it first presented itself to the poet's
imagination in the first of these forms, and as a drama it
always remains in the reader's memory, so prominent is the
old dramatic framework still beneath Milton's epic struc-
ture I When Dante had finished his terrible Inferno, when
he had closed its doors and nought remained save to give
his work a name, the unerring instinct of his genius showed
him that that multiform poem was an emanation of the
drama, not of the epic; and on the front of that gigantic
monument, he wrote with his pen of bronze: Dtvma
Commedia.
TO CROMWELL 57S
^ Thus we see that the only two poets of modern times who
e of Shakespeare's stature follow him in unity of design.
They coincide with him in imparting a dramatic tinge to
all our poetry; like him, they blend the grotesque with the
sublime ; and, far from standing by themselves in the great
literary ensemble that rests upon Shakespeare, Dante and
Milton are, in some sort, the two supporting abutments of
the edifice of which he is the centra! pillar, the buttresses
of the arch of which he is the keystone.
Permit us, at this point, to recur to certain ideas already
suggested, which, however, it is necessary to emphasize.
We have arrived, and now we must set out again.
On the day when Christianity said to man : " Thou art
twofold, thou art made up of two beings, one perisliabJe, the
other immortal, one carnal, the other ethereal, one en-
slaved by appetites, cravings and passions, the other borne
aloft on the wings of enthusiasm and reverie — in a word,
the one always stooping toward the earth, its mother, the
other always darting up toward heaven, its fatherland" —
on that day the drama was created. Is it, in truth, any-
thing other than that contrast of every day, tliat struggle
of every moment, between two opposing principles which
are ever face to face in life, and which dispute possession
of man from the cradle to the tomb?
The poetry born of Christianity, the poetry of our time,
is, therefore, the drama; the real results from the wholly
natural combination of two types, the sublime and the
grotesque, which meet in the drama, as they meet in
life and in creation. For true poetry, complete poetry,
consists in the harmony of contraries. Hence, it is time
to say aloud — and it is here above all that exceptions
prove the rule — that everything that exists in nature
exists in art,
On taking one's stand at this point of view, to pass judg-
ment on our petty conventional rules, to disentangle all those
scholastic labyrinths, to solve all those trivia! problems which
the critics of the last two centuries have laboriously built up
about the art, one is struck by the promptitude with which
the question of the modem stage is made clear and distinct.
The drama has but to take a step to break all the spider's webs
374
YICTOR HUGO
with which the militia of Lilliput have attempted to fetter
its sleep.
And so, let addle-pated pedants (one does not exclude
the other) claim that the deformed, the ugly, the grotesque
should never be imitated in art; one replies that the gro-
tesque is comedy, and that comedy apparently makes a part
of art Tarluffe is not handsome, Pourceaugnac is not noble,
but Pourceaugnac and Tartuffe are admirable dashes of art.
If, driven back from this entrenchment to their second
line of custom-houses, they renew their prohibition of tlie
grotesque coupled with tlie sublime, of comedy melted into
tragedy, we prove to them that, in the poetry of Christian
nations, the first of these two types represents the human
beast, the second the soul. These two stalks of art, if we
prevent their branches from mingling-, if we persistently
separate them, will produce by way of fruit, on tlie i^ne
hand abstract vices and absurdities, on the other, abstract
crime, heroism and virtue. The two types, thus isolated
and left to themselves, will go each its own way, leaving
the real between them, at the left hand of one, at the right
hand of the other. Whence it follows that after all these
abstractions there will remain something to represent —
man; after these tragedies and comedies, something to
create — the drama.
In the drama, as it may he conceived at least, if not
executed, all things are connected and follow one another
as in real life. The body plays its part no less than the
mind; and men and events, set in motion by this twofold
agent, pass across the stage, burlesque and terrible in turn,
and sometimes both at once. Thus the judge will say:
"Off with his head and let us go to dinner!" Thus tlie
Roman Senate will deliberate over Domitian's turbot Thus
Socrates, drinking the hemlock and discoursing on the im-
mortal soul and the only God, will interrupt himself to
suggest that a cook be sacrificed to ^^sculapius. Thus
Elizabeth will swear and talk Latin. Thus Richelieu will
submit to Joseph the Capuchin, and Louis XI to his barber,
Maitre Olivier le Diable. Thus Cromwell will say: "I
have Parliament in my bag and the King in my pocket";
' or, with the hand that signed the death sentence of Charles
TO CROMWELL
the First, smear with ink the face of a regicide who smil-
ingly returns the compliment. Thus Cssar, in his triumphal
car, will be afraid of overturning. For men of genius,
however great they be, have always within them a touch
of the beast which mocks at their intelligence. Therein they
are akin to mankind in general, for therein they are dramatic.
" It is but a step from the sublime to the ridiculous," said
Napoleon, when he was convinced that he was mere man;
and that outburst of a soul on fire illumines art and history
at once; that cry of anguish is the resume of the drama and
of life.
It is a striking fact that all these contrasts are met with
in the poets themselves, taken as men. By dint of meditat-
ing upon existence, of laying stress upon its hitter irony,
of pouring floods of sarcasm and raillery upon our infirm-
ities, the very men who make us laugh so heartily become
profoundly sad. These Democrituses are Heraclituses as
well. Beaumarchais was surly, Moliere gloomy, Shakespeare
melancholy.
The fact is, then, that the grotesque is one of the supreme
beauties of the drama. It is not simply an appropriate
element of it, but is oftentimes a necessity. Sometimes it
appears in homogeneous masses, in entire characters, as
Daudin, Prusias, Trissotin, Brid'oison, Juliet's nurse; some-
times impregnated with terror, as Richard III, Begears,
Tartuffe, Mephistopheles ; sometimes, too, with a veil of
grace and refinement, as Figaro, Osric, Mercutio, Don Juan,
It finds its way in everywhere: for just as the most com-
monplace have their occasional moments of sublimity, so
the most exalted frequently pay tribute to the trivial and
ridiculous. Thus, often impalpable, often imperceptible, it
is always present on the stage, even when it says nothing,
even when it keeps out of sight. Thanks to it, there is no
thought of monotony. Sometimes it injects laughter, some-
times horror, into tragedy. It will bring Romeo face to face
with the apothecary, Macbeth with the witches, Hamlet with
the grave-diggers. Sometimes it may, without discord, as in
the scene between King Lear and his jester, mingle its shrill
voice with the most sublime, the most dismal, the dreamiest
uiDUsic of the soul.
376
VICTOB HUGO
That is what Shakespeare alone among all has succeeded
in doing, in a fashion of his own, which it would be no
less fruitless than impossible to imitate — Shakespeare, the
god of the stage, in whom, as in a trinity, the three char-
acteristic geniuses of our stage, Comeille, Moliere, Beau-
ma rchais, seem united.
Wc see how quickly the arbitrary distinction between the
species of poetry vanishes before common sense and taste.
No less easily one might demolish the alleged nUe of the
two unities. We say two and not Ihree unities, because
unity of plot or of ensemble, the only true and well-founded
one, was long ago removed from the sphere of discussion.
Distinguished contemporaries, foreigners and Frenchmen,
have already attacked, both in theory and in practice, that
fundamental law of the p sen do -Aristotelian code. Indeed,
the combat was not likely to be a long one. At the first
blow it cracked, so worm-eaten was that timber of the old
scholastic hovel !
The strange thing is that the slaves of routine pretend
to rest their rule of the two unities on probability, whereas
reality is the very thing that destroys it Indeed, what
could be more improbable and absurd than this porch or
peristyle or ante-^Jiamber — vulgar places where our trage-
dies are obliging enough to develop themselves; whither
conspirators come, no one knows whence, to declaim against
the tyrant, and the tyrant to declaim against the con-
spirators, each in turn, as if they had said to one another
in bucolic phrase: —
Altemis
amant attema Cataeiue:.
Where did anyone ever see a porch or peristyle of that
sort? What could be more opposed — we will not say to
the truth, for the scholastics hold it very cheap, but to
probability? The result is that everything that is too
characteristic, too intimate, too local, to happen in the
ante-chamber or on the street-comer — that is to say, the
whole drama — takes place in the wings. We see on the
stage only the elbows of the plot, so to speak; its hands
are somewhere else. Instead of scenes we have narrative;
ilutead of tableaux, descriptions. Solemn-faced characters,
TO CROMWELL 377
laced, as in the old chorus, between the drama and our-
selves, tell us what is going on in the temple, in the palace,
on the public square, until we are tempted many a time
to call out to them: "Indeed! then take us there! It
must be very entertaining — a fine sight I" To which they
would reply no doubt; "It is quite possible that it might
entertain or interest you, but that isn't the question ; we are
the guardians of the dignity of the French Melpomene." And
there you are 1
" But," someone will say, " this rule that you discard is
borrowed from the Greek drama." Wherein, pray, do the
Greek stage and drama resemble our stage and drama?
Moreover, we have already shown that the vast extent of
the ancient stage enabled it to include a whole locality, so
that the poet could, according to the exigencies of the plot,
transport it at his pleasure from one part of the stage to
another, which is praWically equivalent to a change of stage-
setting. Curious contradiction ! the Greek theatre, restricted
as it was to a national and religious object, was much more
free than ours, whose only object is the enjoyment, and, if
you please, the instruction, of the spectator. The reason is
that the one obeys only the laws that are suited to it, while the
other takes upon itself conditions of existence which are
absolutely foreign to its essence. One is artistic, the other
artificial.
People are beginning to understand in our day that exact
localization is one of the first elements of reality. The speak-
ing or acting characters are not the only ones who engrave on
the minds of the spectators a faithful representation of the
facts. The place where this or that catastrophe took place
becomes a terrible and inseparable witness thereof; and the
absence of silent characters of this sort would make the
greatest scenes cf history incomplete in the drama. Would
the poet dare to murder Rizzio elsewhere than in Mnry
Stuart's chamber? to stab Henri IV elsewhere than in Rue
de la Ferronerie, alt blocked with drays and carriages? to
bum Jeanne d'Arc elsewhere than in the Vieux-March^ ? to
despatch the Due de Guise elsewhere than in that chateau of
Blois where his ambition roused a popular assemblage to
frenzy ? to behead Charles I and Louis XVI elsewhere than in
^
those ill-omened localities whence Whitehall or the Tuileries
may be seen, as if their scaffolds were appurtenajices of their
palaces ?
Unity of lime rests on no firmer foundation than unity
of place. A plot forcibly confined within twenty-four hours
is as absurd as one confined within a peristyle. Every plot
has its proper duralion as well as its appropriate place. Think
of administering the Bame dose of time to all events! of
applying the same measure to everything! You would laugh
at a cobbler who should attempt to put the same shoe on
every fooL To cross unity of time and unity of place like
the bars of a cage, and pedantically to introduce therein, in
the name of Aristotle, all tlie deeds, all the nations, all the
figures which Providence sets before us in such vast numbers
in real life, — to proceed thus is to mutilate men and things,
to cause history to make wry faces. Let us say, rather, that
everything will die in the operation, and so the dogmatic
mutilaters reach their ordinary result : what was alive in the
chronicles is dead in tragedy. That is why the cage of the
unities often contains only a skeleton.
And then, if twenty-four hours can be comprised In two,
it is a logical consequence that four hours may contain forty-
eight. Thus Shakespeare's unity must be different from
Corneille's, 'Tis pity 1
But these are the wretched quibbles with which medi-
ocrity, envy and routine has pestered genius for two cen-
turies past! By such means the flight of our greatest poets
has been cut short. Their wings have been dipped with the
scissors of the unities. And what has been given us in ex-
change for the eagle feathers stolen from CoroeiUe and
Racine? Campistron.
We imagine that someone may say : " There is some-
thing in too frequent changes of scene which confuses and
fatigues the spectator, and which produces a bewildering
efifect on his attention; it may be, too, that manifold tran-
sitions from place to place, from one time to another tim^
demand explanations which repel the attention; one should
also avoid leaving, in the midst of a plot, gaps which pre-
vent the different parts of the drama from adhering closely
to one another, and which, moreover, puzzle the spectator
TO CROMWELL
379
Ecause he does not know what there may be in those gaps."
Sut these are precisely the difficulties which art has to mceL
These are some of the obstacles peculiar to one subject or
another, as to which it would be impossible to pass judgment
once for all. It is for genius to overcome, not for treatises
or poetry to evade them.
A final argument, taken from the very bowels of the art,
would of itself suffice to show the absurdity of the rule of
the two unities. It is the existence of the third unity, unity
of plot — the only one that is universally admitted, because it
results from a fact: neither the human eye nor the human
mind can grasp more than one ensemble at one time. This
one is as essential as the other two are useless. It is the one
which fixes the view-point of the drama; now, by that very
fact, it excludes the other two. There can no more be three
unities in the drama than three horizons in a picture. But
let us be careful not to confound unity with simplicity of
plot. The former does not in any way exclude the secondary
plots on which the principal plot may depend. It is necessary
on!y that these parts, being skilfully subordinated to the gen-
era! plan, shall tend constantly toward the central plot and
group themselves about it at the various stages, or rather on
the various levels of the drama. Unity of plot is the stage law
oil perspective,
"But," the customs-officers of thought will cry. "great
geniuses have submitted to these rules which you spurn!"
Unfortunately, yes. But what would those admirable men
have done if they had been left to themselves? At all events
they did not accept your chains without a struggle. You
should have seen how Pierre Corneille, worried and harassed
3t his first step in the art on account of his marvellous work,
Le Cid, struj^led under Mairet, Claveret, d'Aubignac and
Scuderi I How he denounced to posterity the violent attacks
of those men, who, he says, made themselves "all white with
Aristotle!" You should read how they said to him — and
we quote from books of the time: "Young man, you must
learn before you teach ; and unless one is a Scaliger or a
Heinsius that is intolerable!" Thereupon Corneiile rebels
and asks if their purpose is to force him "much below
. ^yeret" Here Scuderi wkxcs indignant at such a display
^JtO VICTOH HUGO
of pride, and reminds the " thrice great author of Le Cid
of the modest words in which Tasso, the greatest man of his
age, began his apology for the hnest of his works against the
bitterest and most unjust censure perhaps that will ever be
pronounced. M. Comeille," he adds, "shows in his replies
that he is as far removed from that author's moderation as
from his merit." The young man so justly and gently reproved
dares to protest ; thereupon Scuderi returns to the charge ; he
calls to his assistance the Eminent Academy: "Pronounce,
O my Judges, a decree worthy of your eminence, which will
give all Europe to know that Le Cid is not the chef-d'oeuvre
of the greatest man in France, but the least judicious per-
formance of M, Comeille himself. You arc bound to do it,
both for your own private renown ; and for that of our people
in general, who are concerned in this matter; inasmuch as
foreigners who may see this precious masterpiece — they who
have possessed a Tasso or a Guarini — might think that our
greatest masters were no more than apprentices."
These few instructive lines contain the everlasting tactics
of envious routine against growing talent — tactics which are
Still followed in our own day, and which, fur example, added
such a curious page to the youthful essays of Lord Byron.
Scuderi gives us its quintessence. In like manner the earlier
works of a man of genius are always preferred to the newer
ones, in order to prove that he is going down instead of up —
Milite and La GaUrie du Palais placed above Le Cid. And
the names of the dead are always thrown at the heads of the
living — Comeille stoned with Tasso and Guarini (Guarinil),
as, later, Racine will be stoned with Comeille, Voltaire with
Racine, and as to-day, everyone who shows signs of rising is
Stoned with Comeille, Racine and Voltaire. These tactics, as
will be seen, are well-wom ; but they must be effective as they
are still in use. However, the poor devil of a great man still
breathed. Here we cannot help but admire the way in which
Scuderi, the bully of this tragic-comedy, forced to the wall,
blackguards and maltreats him, how pitilessly he unmasks
his classical artillery, how he shows the author of Le Cid
"what the episodes should be. according to Aristotle, who
tells us in the tenth and sixteenth chapters of his Poetics";
how he crushes Comeille, in the name of the same Aristotle
^ TO CROUWELL 381
^in the eleventh chapter of his Art of Poetry, wherein we
■ find the condemnation of Le Cid"; in the name of Plato,
" in the tenth book of his Republic "; in the name of Mar-
cellinus, " as may be seen in the twenty -seventh book " ; in
the name of " the tragedies of Niobe and Jephthah " ; in
the name of the " Ajax of Sophocles " ; in the name of
"the example of Euripides"; in the name of " Heinsius,
chapter six of the Constitution of Tragedy; and the younger
Scaliger in his poems " ; and finally, in the name of the
Canonists and Jurisconsults, under the title "Nuptials."
The first arguments were addressed to the Academy, the
last one was aimed at the Cardinal. After the pin-pricks
the blow with a club. A judge was needed to decide the
question. Chapelain gave judgment, ComeiUe saw that he
was doomed; the lion was muzzled, or, as was said at the
time, the crow (Conieille) was plucked. Now comes the
painful side of this grotesque performance: after he had
been thus quenched at his first flash, this genius, thoroughly
modern, fed upon the Middle Ages and Spain, being com-
pelled to lie to himself and to hark back to ancient times,
drew for us tliat Castilian Rome, which is sublime beyond
question, but in which, except perhaps in NicomHe, which
was so ridiculed by the eighteenth century for its dignified
and simple colouring, we find neither the real Rome nor
the true Corneille.
Racine was treated to the same persecution, but did not
make the same resistance. Neither in his genius nor in his
character was there any of Comeille's lofty asperity. He
submitted in silence and sacrificed to the scorn of his
time his enchanting elegy of Esther, his magnificent epic,
Alhalie. So that we can but believe that, if he had not
been paralyzed as he was by the prejudices of his epoch, if
he had come in contact less frequently with the classic
cramp-fish, he would not have failed to introduce Locuste
in his drama between Narcisse and Neron, and above all
things would not have relegated to the wings the admirable
scene of the banquet at which Seneca's pupil poisons
Britannicus in the cup of reconciliation. But can we de-
mand of the bird that he fly under the receiver of an air-
mp7 What a multitude of beautiful scenes the people
gn VICTOB HTTGO
of tasle have cost us, from Scuderi to La Harpel A noble
work might be composed of all that tbeir scorcbing breath
has withered in its germ. However, our great poets have
found a way none the less to cause their genius to blaze
forth through all these obstacles. Often the attempt to
con6ne them behind walls of dogmas and rules is vain.
Like the Hebrew giant they carry their prison doors with
them to the mountains.
But still the same refrain is repeated, and will be, no
doubt, for a long while to come: "Follow the rules I Copy
the models I It was the rules that shaped the models."
One moment! In that case there are two sorts of models,
those which are made according to the rules, and, prior to
them, those according to which the rules were made. Now,
in which of these two categories should genius seek a place
for itself? Although it is always disagreeable to come in
contact with pedants, is it not a thousand times better to give
them lessons than to receive lessons from them? And
then — copy! Is the reflection equal to the Hght? Is the
satellite which travels unceasingly in the same circle equal
to the central creative planet? With all his poetry Virgil
is no more than the moon of Homer.
And whom are we to copy, I pray to know? The
ancients? We have just shown that their stage has nothing
in common with ours. Moreover, Voltaire, who will havs
none of Shakespeare, will have none of the Greeks, either.
Let him tell us why: "The Greeks ventured to produce
scenes no less revolting to us. Hippolyte, crushed by his
fall, counts his wounds and utters doleful cries. Philoctetes
falls in his paroxysms of pain; black blood flows from his
wound. (Edipus, covered with the blood that still drops
from the sockets of the eyes he has torn out, complains.
bitterly of gods and men. We hear the shrieks of Cly-
temnestra, murdered by her own son, and Electra, on the
stage, cries: 'Strike I spare her not! she did not spare
our father.' Prometheus is fastened to a rock by nails
driven through his stomach and his arms. The Furies reply
to Clytemnestra's bleeding shade with inarticulate roars.
Art was in its infancy in the time of .£schylus as it was
in London in Shakespeare's time."
TO CROMWELL 393
t Whom shall we copy, then? The moderns? What!
-copy copies I God forbid!
" But," someone else will object, " according to your
conception of the art, you seem to look for none but great
poets, to count always upon genius." Art certainly does
not count upon mediocrity. It prescribes no rules for it,
it knows nothing of it ; in fact, mediocrity has no existence
so far as art is concerned ; art supplies wings, not crutches.
Alas ! D'Aubignac followed rules, Campistron copied mod-
els. What does it matter to art? It does not build its pal- ,
aces for ants. It lets them make their ant-hill, without '
taking the trouble to find out whether they have built their
burlesque imitation of its palace upon its foundation.
The critics of the scholastic school place their poets in a
strange position. On the one hand they cry incessantly :
" Copy the models ! " On the other hand they have a habit
of declaring that " the models are inimitable !" Now,
if their craftsman, by dint of hard work, succeeds in forcing
through this dangerous defile some colourless, tracing of
the masters, these ungrateful wretches, after examining the
new refaccitnienio, exclaim sometimes: "This doesn't re-
semble anything I" and sometimes: " This resembles every-
thing !" And by virtue of a logic made for the occasion each
of these formulae is a criticism.
Let us then speak boldly. The time for it has come, and
it would be strange if, in this age, liberty, like the light,
should penetrate everywhere except to the one place where
freedom is most natural — the domain of thought. Let us
take the hammer to theories and poetic systems. Let us
throw down the old plastering that conceals the fai^ade
of art. There are neither rules nor models; or, rather,
there are no other rules than the general laws of nature,
which soar above the whole field of art, and the special
rules which result from the conditions appropriate to the
subject of each composition. The former are of the es-
sence, eternal, and do not change ; the latter are variable,
external, and are used but once. The former are the frame-
work that supports the house; the latter the scaffolding
which is used in building it, and which is made anew for
each building. In a word, the former are the flesh and
VICTOR HUGO
bones, the latter the clothing, of tbe drama. But tiiese
rules arc not written in the treatises oa poetry. Richelet
has no idea of their existence. Gynhis, which divines
lather than leams, devises for each worl: the general
roles from the general plan of things, the special rules from
the separate ensemble of the subject treated; not after the
manner of the chemist, who tights the fire under his fur-
nace, heats his crucible, analyses and destroys; but after
the manner of the bee, which Sies on its golden wings,
lights on each flower and extracts its boney, learing it as
brilliant and fragrant as before.
The poet — let us insist on this point — should talce counsel
therefore only of nature, truth, and inspiration which is
itself both truth and nature. " Quando be," says Lope de
Vega,
" Quando be de escriTir una cmaedia,
Bocierro los preceptos cod seia IlaTcs."
To secure these precepts " six keys " are none too many,
in very truth. Let the poet beware especially of copying
anything whatsoever — Shakespeare no more than Moliere,
Schiller no more than Comeille. If genuine talent could
abdicate its own nature in this matter, and thus lay aside
its original personality, to transform itself into another.
it would lose everything by playing this role of its own
double. It is as if a god should turn valet. We must draw
our inspiration from the original sources. It is the same
sap, distributed through the soil, that produces all the trees
of the forest, so different in bearing power, in fruit, in
foliage. It is the same nature that fertilizes and nourishes
the most diverse geniuses. The poet is a tree that may
be blown about by all winds and watered by every fall of
dew; and bears his works as his fruit, as the fablier of
old bore his fables. Why attach one's self to a master, or
graft one's self upon a model? It were better to be a
bramble or a thistle, fed by the same earth as the cedar and
the palm, than the fungus or the lichen of those noble
trees. The bramble lives, the fungus vegetates. More-
over, however great the cedar and the palm may be, it is
not with the sap one sucks from them that one can become
great one's self. A giant's parasite will be at best a dwarf.
TO CROMWBIJ, SS5
f oak, colossus that it is, can produce and sustain nothing
more than the mistletoe.
Let there be no misunderstanding: if some of our poets
have succeeded in being great, even when copying, it is
because, while forming themselves on the antique model,
they have often listened to the voice of nature and to their
own genius — it is because they have been themselves in
some one respect, Their branches became entangled in
those of the near-by tree, but their roots were buried deep
in the soil of art. They were the ivy, not the mistletoe.
Then came imitators of the second rank, who, having
neither roots in the earth, nor genius in their souls, had
to confine themselves to imitation. As Charles Nodier
says: "After the school of Athens, the school of Alex-
andria." Then there was a deluge of mediocrity; then
there came a swarm of those treatises on poetry, so annoy-
ing to tnie talent, so convenient for mediocrity. We were
told that everything was done, and God was forbidden to
create more Molieres or Comeilles. Memory was put in
place of imagination. Imagination itself was subjected to
hard-and-fast rules, and aphorisms were made about it:
"To imagine," says La Harpe, with his naive assurance,
" is in substance to remember, that is all."
But nature I Nature and truth ! — And here, in order to
prove that, far from demolishing art, the new ideas aim
only to reconstruct it more firmly and on a better founda-
tion, let us try to point out the impassable limit which
in our opinion, separates reality according to art from
reality according to nature. It is careless to confuse them
as some ill-informed partisans of romanticism do. Truth
in art cannot possibly be, as several writers have claimed,
absolute reality. Art cannot produce the thing itself. Let
us imagine, for example, one of those unreflecting pro-
moters of absolute nature, of nature viewed apart from art.
at the performance of a romantic play, say Le Cid. " What's
thatl"' he will ask at the first word. "The Cid speaks in
verse? It isn't natural to speak in verse." — "How would
you have him speak, pray?" — "In prose."' Very good. A
moment later, " How's this ! " he will continue, if he
ia co nMstent; "the Cid is speaking French 1" — ^"Wcll?"— •
(13) UC— Vol, 39
VTOTOR HUGO
" Nature demands that he speak his own language ; he cant
speak anything but Spanish."
We shall fail entirely to understand, but again — very
good. You imagine that this is all? By no means: before
the tenth sentence in Castilian, he is certain to rise and
ask if the Cid who is speaking is the real CId, in flesh
and blood. By what right does the actor, whose nanie is
Pierre or Jacques, take the name of the Cid? That is false.
There is no reason why he should not go on to demand that
the Sim should be substituted for the footlights, real trees
and real houses for those deceitful wings. For, once started
on that road, logic has you by the collar, and you cannot
slop.
We must admit, therefore, or confess ourselves ridiculous,
that the domains of art and of nature are entirely distinct.
Nature and art are two things — ^wcre it not so, one or
the other would not exist. Art, in addition to its idealistic
side, has a terrestrial, material side. Let it do what it
will, it is shut in between grammar and prosody, between
Vaugelas and Richelet For its most capricious creations,
it has formulae, methods of execution, a compiete apparatus
to set in motion. For genius there are delicate instruments,
for mediocrity, tools.
It seems to us that someone has already said that the
drama is a mirror wherein nature is reflected. But if it
be an ordinary mirror, a smooth and polished surface, it
will give only a dull image of objects, with no relief —
faithful, but colourless; everyone knows that colour and
light are lost in a simple reflection. The drama, there-
fore, must he a concentrating mirror, which, instead of
weakening, concentrates and condenses the coloured rays,
which makes of a mere gleam a light, and of a light a
flame. Then only is the drama acknowledged by art
The stage is an optical point Everything that exists in
the world — in history, in life, in man — should be and can
be reflected therein, but under the magic wand of art. Art
turns the leaves of the ages, of nature, studies chron-
icles, strives to reproduce actual facts (especially in re-
spect to manners .ind peculiarities, which are much less
exposed to doubt and contradiction than are concrete facts).
TO CROMWELL 387
tores what the chroniclers have lopped o£f, harmonises
[ they have collected, divines and supplies their omis-
sions, fills their gaps with imaginary scenes which have the
colour of the time, groups what they have left scattered
about, sets in motion anew the tlireads of Providence which
work the human marionettes, clothes the whole with a
form at once poetical and natural, and imparts to it that
vitality of truth and brilliancy which gives birth to illusion,
that prestige of reality which arouses the enthusiasm of the
spectator, and of the poet 6rst of all, for the poet is
sincere. Thus the aim of art is almost divine: to bring to
life again if it is writing history, to create if it is writing
poetry.
It is a grand and beautiful sight to see this broad de-
velopment of a drama wherein art powerfully seconds na-
ture; of a drama wherein the plot moves on to the con-
clusion with a firm and unembarrassed step, without dit-
fuseness and without undue compression; of a drama,
in short, wherein the poet abundantly fulfills the multifold
object of art, which is to open to the spectator a double
prospect, to illuminate at the same time the interior and
the exterior of mankind: the exterior by their speech and
their acts, the interior, by asides and monologues; to bring
together, in a word, in the same picture, the drama of life
and the drama of conscience.
It will readily be imagined that, for a work of this
kind, if the poet must choose (and he must), he should
choose, not the beautiful, but the characteristic. Not that
it is advisable to "make local colour," as they say to-day;
that is, to add as an afterthought a few discordant touches
here and there to a work that is at beat utterly conventional
and false. The local colour should not be on the surface of
the drama, but in its substance, in the very heart of the
work, whence it spreads of itself, naturally, evenly, and, so
to speak, into every comer of the drama, as the sap ascends
from the root to the tree's topmost leaf. The drama
should be thoroughly impregnated with this colour of the
time, which should be. in some sort, in the air, so that one
detects it only on entering the theatre, and that on going
forth one finds one's self in a different period and atmos-
tn VICTOR HUGO
phere. It requires some study, some labour, to attain thJa
end; so much the better. It is well that the avenues of art
should be obstructed by those brambles from which every-
body recoils except those of powerful will. Besides, it is
this very study, fostered by an ardent inspiration, which will
ensure the drama against a vice that kills it — the common-
place. To be commonplace is the failing of short-sighted,
short-breathed poets. In this tableau of the stage, each
figure must be held down to its most prominent, most
individual, most precisely defined characteristic. Even the
vulgar and the trivial should have an accent of their own.
Like God, the true poet is presnet in every part of his work
at once. Genius resembles the die which stamps the king's
effigy on copper and golden coins alike.
We do not hesitate — and this will demonstrate once more
lo honest men how far we are from seeking to discredit
the art — we do not hesitate to consider verse as one of
the means best adapted to protect the drama from the
scourge we have just mentioned, as one of the most power-
ful dams against the irruption of the commonplace, which,
like democracy, is always flowing between full banks in
men's minds. And at this point we beg the younger literary
generation, already so rich in men and in works, to allow
us lo point out an error into which it seems to have fallen
— an error too fully Justified, indeed, by the extraordinary
aberrations of the old school. The new century is at that
growing age at which one can readily set one's self right
There has appeared of late, like a penultimate branch-
ing-out of the old classical trunk, or. better still, like one
of those excrescences, those polypi, which decrepitude de-
velops, and which are a sign of decomposition much more
than a proof of liic — there has appeared a strange school
of dramatic poetry. This school seems to us to have had
for its master and its fountain-head the poet who marks
the transition from the eighteenth to the nineteenth cen-
tury, the man of wearisome description and periphrases
— that Delille who, they say, toward the close of his life,
boasted, after the fashion of the Homeric catalogues, of
hanng minie twelve camels four dogs, three horses, in-
cluding Job's, £ix tigers, two cats, a chess-board, a back-
gammon-board, a checker-board, a billiard- table, several
winters, many summers, a multitude of springs, fifty sun-
sets, and so many daybreaks that he had tost count of
them.
Now, Delille went into tragedy. He is the father (he,
and not Racine, God save the mark I) of an alleged school
of refinement and laste which flourished until recently.
Tragedy is not to this school what it was to Will Shakes-
peare, say, a source of emotions of every sort, but a
convenient frame for the solution of a multitude of petty
descriptive problems which it propounds as it goes along,
This ranse, far from spurning, as the true French classic
school does, the trivial and degrading things of life,
eagerly seeks them out and brings them together. The
grotesque, shunned as undesirable company by the tragedy
of Louis the Fourteenth's day, cannot pass unnoticed be-
fore her. Il itiust be described, that is to say, ennobled.
A scene in the guard-house, a popular uprising, the fish-
market, the galleys, the wine-shop, the poulc au pot of
Henri Quatre, are treasure-trove in her eyes. She seizes
upon this canaille, washes it clean, and sews her tinsel
and spangles over its villainies; purpureus assuitur pan-
nus. Her object seems to be to deliver patents of nobility
to all these roturu-rs of the drama ; and each of these patents
under the great seal is a speech.
This muse, as may be imagined, is of a rare prudery.
Wonted as she is to the caresses of periphrasis, plain-
speaking, if she should occasionally be exposed to it, would
horrify her. It does not accord with her dignity to speak
naturally. She underlines old Corneille for his blunt way
of speaking, as in, —
" A Afafi of Men ruined by debt and Crimes,"
"Cbimeiie, inAo'd havt thought ilf Rudrlgue, wAo'd Jiavt twiitt"
"When tlwilr FlainlnlnB hagglrdwith HaDaibal."
"Obi do Dot iTatreiline with the Republic."
Sbe still has her " Tout beau, monsieur ! " on her heart.
And it needed many "seigneurs" and "madames" to pro-
390
VICTOR HUGO
^
cure forgiveness for our admirable Racine for his mono* \
syllabic " dogs I " and for so brutally bestowing Oaudius
in Agrippina's t>ed.
This Melpomene, as she is called, would shudder at ttie
thought of touching a chronide. She leaves to the
turner the duty of learning the period of the dramas she
writes. In her eyes history is bad form and bad t
How, for example, can one tolerate kings and queens who
swear? They must be elevated from mere regal dignity
to tragic dignity. It was in a promotion of this sort that she
exalted Henri IV. It was thus that the people's king,,
purified by M. Legouve, found his " venlre-aaint-gris "
ignominiously banished from his mouth by two sentences,
and that he was reduced, like the giri in the old fabliau,
to the necessity of letting fall from those royal lips only
pearls and sapphires and rubies: the apotheosis of falsity,
in very truth.
The fact is that nothing is so commonplace as this coo-
ventional refinement and nobility. Nothing original, no
imagination, no invention in this style ; simply what i
has seen everywhere — rhetoric, bombast, commonplace^
flowers of college eloquence, poetry after the style of
Latin verses. The poets of this school are eloquent after
the maimer of stage princes and princesses, always sure
finding in the costumer's labelled cases, cloaks and pinch*
beck crowns, which have no other disadvantage than tliat
of having been used by everybody. If these poets never
turn the leaves of the Bible, it is not because iliey havft
not a bulky book of their own, the Dictionnaire dc rimes.
That is the source of their poetry — fottles aguarum.
It will be seen that, in all this, nature and truth ge
along as best they can. It would be great good luck i
any remnants of either should survive in this cataclyst
of false art, false style, false poetry. This is what haj
caused the errors of several of our distinguished reformer^
Disgusted by the stifTness, the ostentation, the pomposo, oi
this alleged dramatic poetry, ihey have concluded that th<
elements of our poetic language were incompatible with th
natural and the true. Tile Alexandrine had wearied thei
SO often, that they condemned it without giving It a beai
rO CROMWEIX 391
ing, so to speak, and decided, a little hastily, perhaps, that
the drama should be written in prose.
They were mistaken. If in fact the false is predominant
in the style as well as in the action of certain French
tragedies, it is not the verses that should be held re-
sponsible therefore, but the versifiers. It was needful to
condenm, not the form employed, but those who employed
it: the workmen, not the tool.
To convince one's self how few obstacles the nature of
our poetry places in the way of the free expression of
all that is true, we should study our verse, not in Racine,
perhaps, but oftea in Corneiile and always in Moliere.
Racine, a divine poet, is elegiac, lyric, epic; Moliere is
dramatic It is time to deal sternly with the criticisms
heaped upon that admirable style by the wretched taste of
the last century, and to proclaim aloud that Moliere oc-
cupies the topmost pinnacle of our drama, not only as a
poet, but also as a writer. Pahnas fcre liabct isle duos.
Id his work the verse surrounds the idea, becomes of
its very essence, compresses and develops it at once, im-
parts to it a more slender, more definite, more complete
form, and gives us, in some sort, an extract thereof. Verse
is the optical form of thought That is why it is especially
adapted to the perspective of the stage. Constructed in
a certain way, it communicates its relief to things which,
but for it, would be considered insignificant and trivial.
It makes the tissue of style finer and firmer. It is the
knot which stays Ihe thread. It is the girdle which holda
up the garment and gives it all its folds. What could
nature and the true lose, then, by entering into verse? We
ask the question of our prose-writers themselves — what do
they lose in Moliere's poetry? Does wine — we beg pardon
for another trivial illustration — does wine cease to be wine
when it is bottled?
If we were entitled to say what, in our opinion, the style
of dramatic poetry should be, we would declare for a
free, outspoken, sincere verse, which dares say everything
without prudery, express its meaning without seeking for
words; which passes naturally from comedy to tragedy,
from the sublime to the grotesque; by turns practical and
VICTOH HUGO
f tXKtical. botb artistic and inspired, profound and Inqmlsire,
[ of wide range and true; verse which is apt opportaDd^
lo displace the cxsura, in order to di^^uise the mODOtoay
of Alexandrines; more inclined to_ the enjambement that
lengthens the line, than to the inversion of phrases that
confuses the sense; faithful to rhyme, that enslaved queen,
that supreme charm of our poetry, that creator of our
metre; verse that is inexhaustible in the verity of its turns
of thought, unfathomable in its secrets of composition and
of grace; assuming, like Proteus, a. thousand forms witfaoot
chan^ng its type and character; avoiding long speeches;
taking delight in dialogue; always hiding behind the char-
acters of the drama; intent, before everything, on being
in its place, and when it falls to its lot to be beautiful,
being so only by chance, as it were, in spite of itself and
unconsciously; lyric, epic, dramatic, at need; capable of
running through the whole gamut of poetry, of skipping
from high notes to low, from the most exalted to the most
trivial ideas, from the most extravagant to the most solenm,
from the most superficial to the most abstract, without
ever passing beyond the limits of a spoken scene; i
word, such verse as a man would write whom a fairy had
endowed with Corncille's mind and Moliere's brain. It
seems to us that such verse would be as fine as prose.
There would be nothing in common between poetry o£
this sort and that of which w? made a post mortem exam-
iuation just now. The distinction will be easy to point out
if a certain man of talent, to whom the author of this
book is under personal obligation, will allow us to borrow
his clever phrase: the other poetry was descriptive, this
would be picturesque.
Let us repeat, verse on the stage should lay aside all
self-love, all exigence, all coquetry. It is simply a form,
and a form which should admit everything, which has no
laws to impose on the drama, but ou the contrary should
receive everything from it, to be transmitted to the spec-
tator — French, Latin, texts of laws, royal oaths, popular
phrases, comedy, tragedy, laughter, tears, prose and poetry.
Woe to the poet whose verse does not speak out I But
this form is a. form of bronze which encases the thought
TO CROMWELL 393
in its metre beneath which the drama is iodcstruetible,
which engraves it more deeply on the actor's mind, warns
him of what he omits and of what he adds, prevents him
from changing his role, from substituting himself for the
author, makes each word sacred, and causes what the poet
has said to remain vivid a long while in the hearer's mem-
ory. The idea, when steeped in verse, suddenly assumes
a more incisive, more brilliant quality.
One feels that prose, which is necessarily more timid,
obliged to wean the drama from anything like epic or
lyric poetry, reduced to dialogue and to matter-of-fact,
is a long way from possessing these resources. It has much
narrower wings. And then, too, it is much more easy of
access ; mediocrity is at its ease in prose ; and for the
sake of a few works of distinction such as have appeared
of late, the art would very soon be overloaded with abor-
tions and embryos. Another faction of the reformers in-
cline to drama written in both prose and verse, as Shake-
speare composed it. This method has its advantages. There
might, however, be some incongruity in the transitions
from one form to the other ; and when a tissue is homogene-
ous it is much stouter. However, whether the drama
should be written in prose is only a secondary question.
The rank of a work is certain to be fixed, not according
to its form, but according to its intrinsic value. In ques-
tions of this sort, there is only one solution. Tliere is but
one weight that can turn the scale in the balance of art —
that is genius.
Meanwhile, the first, the indispensable merit of a dra-
matic writer, whether he write in prose or verse, ts cor-
rectness. Not a mere superficial correctness, the merit or
defect of the descriptive school, which makes Lhomond and
Restaut the two wings of its Pegasus; but that intimate,
deep-rooted, deliberate correctness, which is permeated with
the genius of a language, which has sounded its roots and
searched its etymology; always unfettered, because it is
sure of its footing, and always more in harmony with the
logic of the language. Our Lady Grammar leads the one
in leading-strings; the other holds grammar in leash. It
can venture anything, can create or invent its style; it
i
has 3 right to do so. For, whatever certain men may
have said who did not think what they were saying, and
among whom we must placr, notably, him who writes these
lines, the French tongue is not fixed and never will be.
A language does not become fi.ted. The human intellect
is always on the march, or, if you prefer, in movement,
and languages with it. Things are made so. When the
body changes, how could the coat not change ? The French
of the nineteenth century can no more be the French of
the eighteenth, than that is the French of the seventeenth.
or than the French of the seventeenth is that of the six-
teenth. Montaigne's language is not Rabelais's, Pascal's
is not Montaigne's, Montesquieu's is not Pascal's. Each of
the four languages, taken by itself, is admirable because
it is original. Every age has its own ideas; it must have
also words adapted to those ideas. Languages are like the
sea, they move to and fro incessantly. At certain times
they leave one shore of the world of thought and over-
flow another. All that their waves thus abandon dries
up and vanishes. It is in this wise that ideas vanish,
that words disappear. It is the same with human tongues
as with everything. Each age adds and takes away some-
thing. What can be done? It is the decree of fate. In
vain, therefore, should we seek to petrify the mobile physiog-
nomy of our idiom in a fixed form. In vain do our liter-
ary Joshuas cry out to the language to stand still ; lan-
guages and the sun do not stand still. The day when
they become fixed, they are dead. — That is why the French ,
of a certain contemporary school is a dead language.
Such are, substantially, but without the more elaborate I
development which would make the evidence in their favour
more complete, the present ideas of the author of this book
concerning the drama. He is far. however, from pre-
suming to put forth his first dramatic essay as an emana- |
tton of these ideas, which, on the contrary, are themselves,
it may be, simply results of its esecution. It would be
very convenient for him, no doubt, and very clever,
rest his book on his preface, and to defend each by the
other. He prefers less cleverness and more frankness. I~
proposes, therefore, to be the first to point out the «
treme tenuity of the thread connecting this preface with
his drama. His first plan, dictated by his laziness, was to
give the work to the public entirely unattended: el demonio
tin las ctiernas, as Yriarte said. It was only after he
had duly brought it to a close, that, at the solicitations of
a few friends, blinded by their friendship, no doubt, he
determined to reckon with himself in a preface — to draw,
so to speak, a map of the poetic voyage he had made,
to take account of the acquisitions, good or bad, that he
had brought home, and of the new aspects in which the
domain of art had presented itself to his mind. Some-
one will take advantage of this admission, doubtless, to
repeat the reproach already uttered by a critic in Ger-
many, that he has written "a treatise in defence of his
poetry," What does it matter? In the first place he was
much more inclined to demolish treatises on poetry than
to write them. And then, would it not be better always
to write treatises based on a poem, than to write poems
based on a treatise? But no, we repeat that he has neither
the talent to create nor the presumption to put forth
systems. " Systems," cleverly said Voltaire, "are like rats
which pass through twenty holes, only to find at last two
or three which will not let them through." It would have
been, therefore, to undertake a useless task and one much
beyond his strength. What he has pleaded, on the con-
trary, is the freedom of art against the despotism of sys-
tems, codes and rules. It is his habit to follow at all
risks whatever he takes for his inspiration, and to change
moulds as often as he changes metals. Dogmatism in
the arts is what he shuns before everything. God for-
bid that he should aspire to be numbered among those
men, be they romanticists or classicists, who compose -works
according to their own systems, who condemn themselves
to have but one form in their minds, to be forever promng
something, to follow other laws than those of their tempera-
ments and their natures. The artificial work of these men,
however talented they may be, has no existence so far as
art is concerned, It is a theory, not poetry.
Having attempted, in all that has gone before, to point
cut what, in our opinion, was the origin of the drama.
VICTOR HLfOO
what its ehaneter is, and what its styk shotiM be, the
time has come to descend from these exalted general con-
sktcrations upon the art to the particular case which has
ted tts to put them forth. It remains for us to discourse
to the reader of our work, of tiiis CramweU; and as it is
not a subject in which we take pleasure, we will say very
little about it in very few words.
Oliver Cromwell is one of those historical characters
who are at once very famous and very little known. Most
of his biographers — and among them there are some who
are themselves historical — ^have left that colossal figure
incomplete. It would seem that the>- dared not assemble all
the characteristic features of that strange and gigantic
prototype of the religious reformation, of the political
revolution of England. Almost all of them have confined
themselves to reproducing on a larger scale the simple and
ominous profile drawn by Bossuet from his Catholic and
monarchical standpoint, from his episcopal pulpit supported
by the throne of Louis XIV.
Like everybody else, the author of this book went no
further than that. The name of Oliver Cromwell sug-
gested to him simply the bare conception of a faaati<^
regicide and a great captain. Only on prowling among
the chronicles of the limes, which he did with delight,
and on looking through the Eng!i5h memoirs of the seven-
teenth century, was he surprised to find that a wholly
new Cromwell was gradually exposed to his gaze. It was
no longer simply Bossuet's Cromwell the soldier, Crom-
well the politician; if was a complex, heterogenous, mul-
tiple being, made up of all sorts of contraries — a mixture
of much that was evil and much that was good, of genius
and pettiness; a sort of Tiberius-Dandio. the tyrant of
Europe and the plaything of his family; an old regicide,
who delighted to humiliate the ambassadors of all the kings
, of Europe, and was tormented by bis young royalist dau^
i ter: austere and gloomy in bis manners, yet keeping four
' court jesters about him; given to the composition of
wretched verses; sober, simple, fnigal, yet a stickler fof
etiquette; a rough soldier and a crafty politician; skilled
in theological disputation and very fond of it; a dull, dif-
TO CROMWELL
fase, obscure orator, but clever in speaking the language
of anybody whom he wished to influence; a hypocrite and
a fanatic; a visionary swayed by phantoms of his child-
hood, believing in astrologers and banishing tliem; suspi-
cious to excess, always threatening, rarely sanguinary; a
strict observer of Puritan rules, and solemnly wasting
several hours a day in buffoonery; abrupt and contemptuous
with his intimates, caressing with the secretaries whom he
feared, holding his remorse at bay with sophistry, pal-
tering with his conscience, inexhaustible in adroitness, in
tricks, in resources; mastering his imagination by his
intelligence; grotesque and sublime; in a word, one of
those men who are "square at the base," as they were
described by Napoleon, himself their chief, in his mathe-
matically exact and poetically figurative language.
He who writes these lines, in presence of this rare and
impressive ensetnbU, felt that Bossuet's impassioned sketch
was no longer sufficient for him. He began to walk about
that lofty figure, and he was seized by a powerful tempta-
tion to depict the giant in all his aspects. It was a rich
soil. Beside the man of war and the statesman, it re-
mained to draw the theologian, the pedant, the wretched
poet, the seer of visions, the buffoon, the father, the hus-
band, the human Proteus — in a word, the twofold Crom-
well, homo ct Ti>.
There is one period of his life, especially, in which this
strange personality exhibits itself in all its forms. It
is not as one might think at first blush, the period of
the trial of Charles I, instinct as that is with depressing
and terrible interest; but it is the moment when the am-
bitious mortal boldly attempted to pluck the fruit of that
monarch's death : it is the moment when Cromwell, hav-
ing attained what would have been to any other man the
zenith of fortune — master of England, whose innumerable
factions knelt silently at his feet; master of Scotland,
of which he had made a satrapy, and of Ireland, which
he had turned into a prison; master of Europe through
his diplomacy and his fleets — seeks to fulfil the dream
of his earliest childhood, the last ambition of his life;
to make himself king. History never had a more im-
VICTOR HUGO
I in ft EDore impressive dmaa. First of aD.
: Protector xrrangca to be urged to assnme tbe crown:
tlic sognst farce begins bjr addresses from mnnictpalides,
from cotmties; dieo there cotaes an act of ParliameoL
CfooiwcU, tfae ajmjmoas atUbor of the play, pretends to
be displeased; we ecc bim put out a hand toward tbe
■ceptre. then draw it bade; by a devious path he draws
near the throne irom which he has swept th^ legitimate
djuasty. At last he makes op his mind, soddenly ; by
bis cominaad Westminster is decked with flags, the dais
is bmh, the crown is ordered from the Jewelers, the day
19 appointed for the ceremooj. — Strange denouement!
that very day, in presence of the populace, the troops.
ifae House of Commons, in the great hall of West-
minster, on that dais from which he expected to descend
as king, saddenly, as if aroused by a shock, he seems
to awaken at the sight of the crown, asks if he is
dreaming, and what the meaning is of all this regal
pomp, and in a speech that lasts three hours declines the
kingly tide.
Was it because his spies had warned him of two con-
spiracies formed ty Cavaliers and Puritans in concert,
which were intended, taking advantage of this misstep, to
break out on the same day ? Was it an inward revolution
caused by the silence or the murmurs of the populace,
discomposed to see their regicide ascend the throne? Or
was it simply the sagacity of genius, the instinct of a
far-seeing, albeit unbridled ambition, which realijies how
one step forward changes a man's position and attitude,
and which dares not expose its plebeian structure to the
wind of unpopularity? Was it all these at once? This
is a question which no contemporaneous document answers
satisfactorily. So much the better: the poet's liberty is
the more complete, and the drama is the gainer by the
latitude which history affords it. It will be seen that
here the latitii'Ie is ample and unique; this is. in truth,
the decisive hour, the turning-point in Cromwell's life.
It is the moment when his chimera escapes from him. when
the present kills the future, when, to use an expressive
colloquialism, his destiny misses fire. All of Cromwell is
TO CnOMWEIX
at Etafce in the comedy being played between England and
himself.
Such then is the man and such the period of which we
have tried to give an idea in this book.
The author has allowed himself to be seduced by the child-
like diversion of touching the keys of that great harpsi-
chord. Unquestionably, more skillful hands might have
evoked a thrilling and profound melody — not of those
which simply caress the ear — but of those intimate har-
monies which stir the whole man to the depths of his
being, as if each key of the key-board were connected with
a fibre of the heart. He has surrendered to the desire to
depict all those fanaticisms, all those superstitions — •
maladies to which religion is subject at certain epochs;
to the longing to " make playthings of all these men," as
Hamlet says. To set in array about and below Cromwell,
himself the centre and pivot of that court, of that people,
of that little world, which attracts all to his cause and
inspires all with his vigour, that twofold conspiracy devised
by two factions which detest each other, but join hands
to overthrow the man who blocks their path, but which
unite simply without blending; and that Puritan faction,
of divers minds, fanatical, gloomy, unselfish, choosing for
leader the most insignificant of men for such a great part,
the egotistical and cowardly Lambert; and the faction o£
the Cavaliers, featherheaded, merry, unscrupulous, reck-
less, devoted, led by the man who, aside from his devo-
tion to the cause, was least fitted to represent it, the stern
and upright Ormond : and those ambassadors, so humble
and fawning before the soldier of fortune; and the court
itself, an extraordinary mixture of upstarts and great
nobles vying with one another in baseness ; and the four
jesters whom the contemptuous neglect of history permitted
me to invent; and Cromwell's family, each member of
which is as a thorn in his flesh; and Thurloe, the Pro-
tector's Achates; and the Jewish rahbi, Israel Ben-Manas-
seh, spy. usurer, and astrologer, vile on two sides, sublime
on the third; and Rochester, the unique Rochester, absurd
and clever, refined and crapulous, ahvays cursing, always
ia lo\e, and always tipsy, as he himself boasted to Bishop
psUc of evtrytiuBg. ot rme and i
and foUjr, viUatsy and gratroi
et whoa history deaertbc* bat one tni^ albrit a a
actcriMic and si^x*>d*e ooe; and tboac
of all nuilu and varietie*: Harriioa. die t _
Barebone* ihe ibopktefaag faoatk ; ^wkronb^ i&e (
Gailand the tearful aad juoiu iwiitrin: i_ ~ ~
Overton, intc]J)gcnt tmt a Cttk dnJamatory; die t
and nnboidiitfr Ludlow, who kft hia aabea and In ■
at Lautanne ; and lastly, " Milton and a few <
of mind," ai we read in a panpbJet of 1673 (Cro
th€ Polifkian), which reminds one of "a cenain Dante'
of the Italian chronicle
We omit many lew important characters, of each of
whnrti, however, the actual life is known, and each of
wliom ha.4 his marked individuality, and all of whom coo-
tribuled to the fascination which this vast historical scene
exerled upon the author's imagination. From that scene
he conklrucled this drama. He moulded it in vers^ be-
cause he preferred to do so. One will discover on read-
ing it how little thought he gave to his work while writing
this preface — with what disinterestedness, for instance,
he contended against the dogma of the unities. His drama
doc* not leave London: it begins on June 25, 1657, at three
in the morning, and ends on the 26th at noon. Observe
that he has almost followed the classic formula, as the
professors of poetry lay it down to-day. They need not,
however, thank him for it. With the permission of history,
not of Aristotle, the author constructed his drama thus;
and because, when the interest is the same, he prefers a
compact subject to a widely diffused one.
If is evident that, in its present proportions, this drama
could not be given at one ot our theatrical performances.
It is too long. The reader will perhaps comprehend, none
the less, that every part of it was written for the stage.
■ It wa^ on approaching his subject to study it that the
author recognised, or thought that he recognized, the ira-
possibility of procuring the performance of a faithful re-
production of it on our stage, in the exceptional position
it now occupies, between the academic Cliarybdis aiid
the administrative Scylla, between the literary juries and
the political censorship. He was required to choose : either
the wheedling, tricky, false tragedy, which may be acted,
or the audaciouiily true drama, which is prohibited.
The first was not worth the trouble o£ wrifing, so he
preferred to. attempt the second. That is why, hopeless
of ever being put on the stage, he abandoned himself, freely
and submissively, to the whims of composition, to the
pleasure of painting with a freer hand, to the develop-
ments whicli his subject demanded, and which, even if they
keep his drama off the stage, have at all events the ad-
vantage of making it almost complete from the historical
standpoint However, the reading committees are an ob-
stacle of the second class only. If it should happen that
the dramatic censorship, reah'zing how far this harmless,
conscientious and accurate picture of Cromwell and his
time is removed from our own age, should sanction its
production on the stage, in that case, but only in that case,
the author might perhaps extract from this drama a play
which would venture to show itself on the boards, and
would be hissed.
Until then he will continue to hold aloof from the
theatre. And even then he will leave his cherished and
tranquil retirement soon enough, for the agitation and
excitement of this new world, God grant that he may
never Repent of having exposed the unspotted obscurity
of his name and his person to the shoals, the squalls and
tempests of the pit, and above all {for what does a mere
failure matter?) to the wretched bickerings of the wings;
of having entered that shifting, foggy, stormy atmosphere, ,
where ignorance dogmatises, where envy hisses, where cabals
cringe and crawl, where the probity of talent has so
often been misrepresented, where the noble innocence of
genius is sometimes so out of place, where mediocrity
triumphs in lowering to Its level the superiority which
obscures it, where one finds so many small men for a
£iogle great one, so many nobodies for one Talma, so many
vjcroai BUGo ^^
Tinf siaetdi wiU seen ill-
tmafmvi fnfc»pv aad tar In^ Sxoxiiag; but does h not
M|f aaife ast the Afttace dm Mjantes otir stage, the
itedt of imnfma md ipnar, fatna the aotemn eerenit^
ttfteaneatXice?
1^ hatV^ k teds booad to wam in ad-
^ pcnoBs wbom such & pro-
A a ftey satde up of excerpts
fttn CrtmmHt waM vaa^y bo less time tben is or-
~ liy a a tttria l ^ a i o tm xatx. It is dif-
itself otherwise.
driBg ^ tiere ot from the trage-
. alistnci types of a
' ■ alxKit oa a oar-
iw «iffc «oeif>(d tmfy I7 « fev caaMoits, coknirless
~ ' I «( Ar hcracK, aifl0^ to ill the gaps in a
" ■ " " " " ; if Oat sort of thing
C b mt too much time
te on^ with his pecnliar
~ipa itself Ifaereto, fais
■h, Itt pMfions vrhicfa throw
lis geains and his beliefs,
M kn BUfooo^ his haluts
I BOidB Ut pwnrwHt ani
of sn of ttvtxj son wboni'
W •! tec* 1
ifcM soeh a pictarc wiU
I o£ oac penouaSitj, I3»
aM •( tbe oU school '
coMNM, *v« «« W t«a«r< tonr. fiftjr.— wfao km
Wv ■M^r>-^4 <WH7 ate wmi «S et e r y degree of i
na>« wai be a ci««4 of dntactcrs la '
^tftpdM It OM W ai m w* j t> asttgn it two boon
t aarf f)«« w <^ "at of tfae fcrfananoe to <
' ' ~ ■ <ar
the multitude of characters set in motion will cause fatigue
to the spectator or confusion in the drama. Shakespeare,
abounding in petty details, is at the same time, and for
that very reason, imposing by the grandeur of the ensemble.
It is the oak which casts a most extensive shadow with
its myriads of slender leaves.
Let us hope that people in France will ere long become
accustomed to devote a whole evening to a single play.
In England and Germany there are plays that last six
hours. The Greeks, about whom we hear so much, the
Greeks — and after the fashion of Scuderi we will cite at
this point the classicist Dacier, in the seventh chapter of
his Poetics — the Greeks sometimes went so far as to
have twelve or sixteen plays acted in a single day. Among
a people who are fond of spectacles the attention is more
lively than is commonly believed. The Manage de Figaro,
the connecting link of Beaumarchais's great trilogy, oc-
cupies the whole evening, and who was ever bored or
fatigued by it. Beaumarchais was worthy to venture on
the first step toward that goal of modern art at which
it will be impossible to arrive in two hours, that pro-
found, insatiable interest which results from a vast, life-
like and multiform plot. " But," someone will say. "this
performance, consisting of a single play, would be monoto-
nous, would seem terribly long." — Not so. On the con-
trary it would lose its present monotony and tediousness.
For what is done now? The spectator's entertainment is
divided into two or three sharply defined parts. At first
he is given two hours of serious enjoyment, then one hour
of hilarious enjoyment; these, with the hour of entr' actes,
which we do not include in the enjoyment, make four hours.
What would the romantic drama do? It would mingle and
blend artistically these two kinds of enjoyment. It would
lead the audience constantly from sobriety to laughter, from
mirthful excitement to heart-breaking emotion, " from grave
to gay, from pleasant to severe." For, as we have already
proved, the drama is the grotesque in conjunction with the
sublime, the sou! within the body; it is tragedy beneath
comedy. Do you not see that, by affording you repose from
impression by means of another, by sharpening the
I Wie i
SH VICrOIl HUGO
bas a right to do so. For, whatever certain men may
have said who did not think what they were saying, and
among whom we must place, notably, him who writes these
lines, the French tongue is not fixed and never will be,
A language does not become fixed. The human intellect
is always on the march, or, i£ you prefer, in movement,
and languages with it. Things are made so. When the
body changes, how could the coat not change ? The Frendi
of the nineteenth century can no more be the French of
the eighteenth, than that is the French of the sci'enteenth,
or than the French of the seventeenth is that of the six-
teenth. Montaigne's language is not Rabelais's, Pascal's
is not Montaigne's, Montesquieu's is not Pascal's. Each of
the four languages, taken by itself, is admirable because
it is OTtginal. Every age has its own ideas ; it must have
also wards adapted to those ideas. Languages are like the
sea, they move to and fro incessantly. At certain times
they leave one shore of the world of thought and over-
flow another. All that their waves thus abandon dries
"up and vanishes. It is in this wise that ideas vanish,
that words disappear. It is the same with human tongues
as with everything. Each age adds and takes away some-
thing. What can be done? It is the decree of fate. In
vain, therefore, should wc seek to petrify the mobile physiog-
nomy of our idiom in a fixed form. In vain do our liter-
ary Joshuas cry out to the language to stand still; lan-
guages and the sun do not stand still. The day when
they become fixed, they are dead. — That is why the French
of a certain contemporary school is a dead language.
Such are, substantially, but without the more elaborate
development which would make the evidence in their favour
more complete, the present ideas of the author of this book
concerning the drama. He is far, however, from pre-
suming to put forth his first dramatic essay as an emana-
tion of these ideas, which, on the contrary, are themselves,
it may be, simply results of its execution. It would be
very convenient for him. no doubt, and very clever, to
rest his hook on his preface, and to defend each hy the
other. He prefers less cleverness and more frankness. He
proposes, therefore, to be the first to point out the as-
trcme tenuity of the thread connecting this preface with
his drama. His first plan, dictated by his laziness, was to
give the work to the pubUc entirely unattended: et demomo
sin las cuernas, as Yriarte said. It was only after he
had duly brought it to a close, that, at the solicitations of
a few friends, blinded by their friendship, no doubt, he
determined to reckon with himself in a preface — to draw,
so to speak, a map of the poetic voyage he had made,
to take account of the acquisitions, good or bad, that he
had brought home, and of the new aspects in which the
domain of art had presented itself to his mind. Some-
one will take advantage of this admission, doubtless, to
repeat the reproach already uttered by a critic in Ger-
many, that he has written "a treatise in defence of his
poetry." What does it matter? In the first place he was
much more inclined to demolish treatises on poetry than
to write them. And then, would it not be better always
to write treatises based on a poem, than to write poems
based on a treatise? But no, we repeat that he has neither
the talent to create nor the presumption to put forth
systems. " Systems," cleverly said Voltaire, "are like rats
which pass through twenty holes, only to find at last two
or three which will not let them through." It would have
been, therefore, to undertake a useless task and one much
beyond his strength. What he has pleaded, on the con-
trary, is the freedom of art against the despotism of sys-
tems, codes and rules. It is his habit to follow at all
risks whatever he takes for his inspiration, and to change
moulds as often as he changes metals. Dogmatism in
the arts is what he shuns before everything. God for-
bid that he should aspire to be numbered among those
men, be they romanticists or classicists, who compose ■works
according to their own systems, who condemn themselves
to have but one form in their minds, to be forever proving
something, to follow other laws than those of their tempera-
ments and their natures. The artificial work of these men,
however talented they may be. has no existence so far as
art is concerned. It is a theory, not poetry.
Having attempted, in all that has gone before, to point
out what, in our opinion, was the origin of the drama.
VICTOR HUGO
what its character is, and what its style should be, the
time has come to descend from these exalted general con-
siderations upon the art to the particular case which has
led us to put them forth. It remains for us to discourse
to the reader of our work, of this Cromwetl; and as it is
not a subject in which we take pleasure, we will say very
little about it in very few words.
Oliver Cromwell is one of those historical characters
who are at once very famous and very little known. Most
of his biographers — and among ihem there are some who
are themselves historical — have left that colossal figure
incomplete. It would seem that they dared not assemble all
the characteristic features of that strange and gigantic
prototype of the religious reformation, of the political
revolution of England. Almost all of them have confined
themselves to reproducing on a larger scale the simple and
ominous profile drawn by Bossuet from his Catholic and
monarchical standpoint, from his episcopal pulpit supported
by the throne of Louis XIV.
Like everybody else, the author of this book went no
further than that. The name of Oliver Cromwell sug-
gested to him simply the bare conception of a fanatical
regicide and a great captain. Only on prowling among
the chronicles of the times, which he did with delight,
and on looking through the English memoirs of the seven-
teenth century, was he surprised to find that a wholly
new Cromwell was gradually exposed to his gaze. It was
no longer simply Bossuefs Cromwell the soldier, Crom-
well the politician ; it was a complex, heterogenous, mul-
tiple being, made up of all sorts of contraries — a mixture
of much that was evil and much that was good, of genius
and pettiness ; a sort of Tiberius-Dandin, the tyrant of
Europe and the plaything of his family: an old regicide,
who dehghted to humiliate the ambassadors of all the kings
of Europe, and was tormented hy his young royalist daugh-
ter; austere and gloomy in his manners, yet keeping four
court jesters about him ; given to the composition of
wretched verses; sober, simple, frugal, yet a stickler for
etiquette; a rough soldier and a crafty politician: skilled
in theological disputation and very fond of it ; a dull, dif-
TO CROMWELL 397
fuse, obscure orator, but clever in speaking the language
of anybody whom he wished to influence; a hypocrite and
a fanatic; a visionary swayed by phantoms of his child-
hood, believing in astrologers and banishing tliem; suspi-
cious to excess, always threatening, rarely sanguinary; a
strict observer of Puritan rules, and solemnfy wasting
several hours a day in buffoonery ; abrupt and contemptuous
with his intimates, caressing with the secretaries whom he
feared, holding his remorse at bay with sophistry, pal-
tering with his conscience, inexhaustible in adroitness, in
tricks, in resources; mastering his imagination by his
intelligence; grotesque and sublime; in a word, one of
those men who are "square at the base," as they were
described by Napoleon, himself their chief, in his mathe-
matically exact and poetically figurative language.
He who writes these lines, in presence of this rare and
impressive ensemble, felt that Bossuet's impassioned sketch
was no longer sufficient for him. He began to walk about
that lofty figure, and he was seized by a powerful tempta-
tion to depict the giant in all his aspects. It was a rich
soil. Beside the man of war and the statesman, it re-
mained to draw the theologian, the pedant, the wretched
poet, the seer of visions, the huffoon, the father, the hus-
band, the human Proteus — in a word, the twofold Crom-
well, homo et vir.
There is one period of his life, especially, in which this
strange personality exhibits itself in all its forms. It
is not as one might think at first blush, the period of
the trial of Charles I, instinct as that is with depressing
and terrible interest; but it is the moment when the am-
bitious mortal boldly attempted to pluck the fruit of that
monarch's death: it is the moment when Cromwell, hav-
ing attained what would have been to any other man the
zenith of fortune — master of England, whose innumerable
factions knelt silently at his feet; master of Scotland,
of which he had made a satrapy, and of Ireland, which
he had turned into a prison; master of Europe through
his diplomacy and his fleets — seeks to fulfil the dream
of his earliest childhood, the last ambition of his life;
to make himself king. History never had a more ini'
VICTOK HUCa
pTGssive lesson in a more impressive drama. First o{ all,
the Protector arranges to be urged to assume the crown:
the august farce begins by addresses from nmnicipalities,
from counties; then there comes an act of Parliament.
Cromwell, the anonymous author of the play, pretends to
be displeased; we see him put out a hand toward the
sceptre, then draw it back: by a devious path he draws
near the throne from which he has swept thj legitimate
dynasty. At last he makes up his mind, suddenly; by
his command Westminster is decked with flags, the dais
is built, the crown is ordered from the jewelers, the day
is appointed for the ceremony. — Strange denouement! On
that very day, in presence of the populace, the troops,
the House of Commons, in the great hall of West-
minster, on that dais from which he eicpecled to descend
as king, suddenly, as if aroused by a shoclc, he seems
to awaken at the sight of the crown, asks if he is
dreaming, and what the meaning is of all this regal
pomp, and in a speech that lasts three hours declines the
kingly title.
Was it because his spies had warned him of two con-
spiracies formed by Cavaliers and Puritans in concert,
which were intended, taking advantage of this misstep, to
break out on the same day? Was it an inward revoluticn
caused by the silence or the murmurs of the populace,
discomposed to see their regicide ascend the throne? Or
was it simply the sagacity of genius, the instinct of a
far-seeing, albeit unbridled ambition, which realizes how
one step forward changes a man's position and attitude,
and which dares not expose its plebeian structure to the
wind of unpopularity? Was it ail these at once? This
is a question which no contemporaneous document answers
satisfactorily. So much the better: the poet's liberty is
the more complete, and the drama is the gainer by the
latitude which history affords it. It will be seen that
here the latitttde is ample and unique; this is, in truth,
the decisive hour, the turning-point in CromweH'a life.
It is the moment when his chimera escapes from him, when
the present Icills the future, when, to use an expressive
colloquialism, his destiny misses fire, AU of Cromwell is
at stake in the comedy being played between England and
himself.
Such then is the man and such ihe period of which we
have tried to give an idea in this book.
The author has allowed himself to be seduced by the child-
like diversion of touching the keys of that great harpsi-
chord. Unquestionably, more skillful hands might have
evoked a thrilling and profound tnelody — not of those
which simply caress the ear — hut of those intimate har-
monies which stir the whole man to the depths of bis
being, as if each key of the key-board were connected with
a fibre of the heart. He has surrendered to the desire to
depict all those fanaticisms, all those superstitions —
maladies to which religion is subject at certain epochs;
to the longing to " make playthings of al! these men," as
Hamlet says. To set in array about and below Cromwell,
himself the centre and pivot of that court, of that people,
of that little world, which attracts ail to his cause and
inspires all with his vigour, that twofold conspiracy devised
by two factions which delest each other, but join hands
to overthrow the man who blocks their path, but which
unite simply without blending; and that Puritan faction,
of divers minds, fanatical, gloomy, unselfish, choosing for
leader the most insignificant of men for such a great part,
the egotistical and cowardly Lambert; and the faction of
the Cavaliers, featherheaded, merry, unscrupulous, reck-
less, devoted, led by the man who, aside from his devo-
tion to the cause, was least fitted to represent it, the stem
and upright Ormond; and those ambassadors, so humble
and fawning before the soldier of fortune; and the court
itself, an extraordinary mixture of upstarts and great
nobles vying with one another in baseness; and the four
jesters whom the contemptuous neglect of history permitted
me to invent; and Cromwell's family, each member of
which is as a thorn in his flesh; and Thurloe, the Pro-
tector's Achates; and the Jewish rabbi, Israel Ben-Manas-
aeh, spy, usurer, and astrologer, vile on two sides, sublime
on the third; and Rochester, the unique Rochester, absurd
and clever, refined and crapulous, always cursing, always
in lov^ and always tipsy, as be himself boasted to Bishop
VICTOB HDOO
Bumet — wrrtclied poet and gallant fentlmisn, vidous
and ingenuous, staking his head and indifferent whether he
wins the game provided it amuses him — in a word, ca-
pable of everything, of ruse and recklessness, calculation
and folly, villainy and generosity; and the morose Carr,
of whom history describes but one trait, albeit a most char-
acteristic and suggestive one; and those other fanatics,
of ail ranks and varieties: Harrison, the thieving fanatic ;
Barebones the shopkeeping fanatic ; Synderconib, the br:
Garland the tearful and pious assassin; gallant Colonel
Overton, intelligenl but a little declamatory; the austere
and unbending Ludlow, who left lue ashes and bis epitaph
at Lausanne; and lastly, "Miiton and a few other
of mind," as we read in a pamphlet of 1675 (Cromwell
the Polilician), which reminds one of "a certain Dante"
of the Italian chronicle.
We omit many less important characters, of each of
whom, however, the actual life is known, and each of
whom has his marked individuality, and all of whom con-
tributed to the fascination which this vast historical scene
exerted upon the author's imagination. From that scene
he constructed this drama. He moulded it in verse, be-
cause he preferred to do so. One will discover on read-
ing it how little thought he gave to his work while writing
this preface — with what disinterestedness, for instance,
he contended against the dogma of the unities. His drama
does not leave London; it begins on June 2$, 1657, at three
in the morning, and ends on the 26th at noon. Observe
that he has almost followed the classic formula, as the
professors of poetry lay it down to-day. They need not,
however, thank him for it. With the permission of history.
not of Aristotle, the author conslructed hia drama thus;
and because, when the interest is the same, he prefers a
compact subject to a widely diffused one.
It IS evident that, in its present proportions, this drama
could not be given at one of our theatrical performances,
It is too long. The reader will perhaps comprehend, none
the less, that every part of it was written for the stage.
. It was on approaching his subject to study it that the
author recognized, or tiiought that he recognized, the im-
I
to*6romwell
possibHity of procuring the performance of a faithful re-
production of it on our stage, in the exceptional position
it now occupies, between the academic Charybdis and
the administrative Scylla, between the literary juries and
the political censorship. He was required to choose: either
the wheedling, tricky, false tragedy, which may be acted,
or the audaciously true drama, which is prohibited.
The first was not worth the trouble of writing, so he
preferred to. attempt (he second. That is why, hopeless
of ever being put on the stage, he abandoned himself, freely
and submissively, to the whims of composition, to the
pleasure of painting with a freer hand, to the develop-
ments whicli his subject demanded, and which, even if tlicy
keep his drama off the stage, have at all events the ad-
vantage of making it almost complete from the iiistorjca!
standpoint However, the reading committees are an ob-
stacle of the second class only. If it should happen that
the dramatic censorship, realizing how far this harmless,
conscientious and accurate picture of Cromwell and his
time is removed from our own age, should sanction its
production on the stage, in that case, but only in that case,
the autiior might perhaps extract from this drama a piay
which would venture to show itself on the boards, and
would be hissed,
Unti! then he will continue to hold aloof from the
theatre. And even then he will leave his cherished and
tranquil retirement soon enough, for the agitation and
excitement of this new world. God grant that he may
never irepent of having exposed the unspotted obscurity
of his name and his person to the shoals, the squalls and
tempests of the pit, and above all (for what does a mere
failure matter?) to the wretched bickerings of the wings;
of having entered that shifting, foggy, stormy atmosphere, :
where ignorance dogmatises, where envy hisses, where cabals
cringe and crawl, where the probity of talent has so
often been misrepresented, where the noble innocence of
genius is sometimes so out of place, where mediocrity
triumphs in lowering to its level the superiority whicli
obscures It, where one iinds so many small men for a
fitngle great one, so many nobodies for one Talma, so many
mynnidons for one Achilles t This sketch will staa ill-
tempered perhaps, and far from Battering; but docs it not
fully mark out the distance that separates our stage, the
abode of intrigues and uproar, from the solemn serenity
of the ancient stage?
Whatever may happen, he feels bound to warn in ad-
vance that small number of persons whom such a pro-
duction might attract, that a play made up of excerpts
from Cromwell would occupy no less time then is or-
dinarily occupied by a theatrical performance. It is dif-
ficult for a romantic theatre to maintain itself otherwise.
Surely, if people desire something different from tlie trage-
dies in which one or two characters, abstract types of a
purely metaphysical idea, stalk solemnly about on a nar-
row stage occupied only by a few confidents, colourless
reflections of the heroes, employed to fill the gaps in a
simple, unified, single-stringed plot; if that sort of thing
has grown tiresome, a whole evening is not too much time
to devote to delineating with some fullness a man among
men, a whole critical period: the one, with his peculiar
temperament, his genius which adapts itself thereto, his
beliefs which dominate them both, his passions which throw
out of gear his temperament, his genius and his beliefs,
his tastes which give colour to his passions, his habits
which regulate his tastes and muzzle his passions, and
with the innumerable processiun of men of every sort whom
these various elements keep in constant commotion about
him; the other, with its manners, its laws, its fashions,
its wit, its attainments, its superstitions, its events, and
its people, whom all these first causes in turn mould like
soft wax. It is needless to say that such a picture will
be of huge proportions. Instead of one personality, like
that with which the abstract drama of tiie old school is
content, there will be twenty, forty, fifty, — who knows
how many? — of every size and of every degree of im-
portance. There will be a crowd of characters in the
drama. Would it not be niggardly to assign it two hours
only, and give up the rest of the performance to opera-
comique or farce? to cut Shakespeare for Bobeche? —
And do not imagine tliat. if the plot is well adjusted,
the multitude of characters set in motion will cause fatigue
to the spectator or confusion in the drama. Shakespeare,
abounding in petty details, is at the same time, and for
that very reason, imposing by the grandeur of the ensemble.
It is the oak which casts a most extensive shadow with
its myriads of slender leaves.
Let us hope that people in France will ere long become
accustomed to devote a whole evening to a single play.
In England and Germany there are plays that last six
hours. The Greeks, about whom we hear so much, the
Greeks — and after the fashion of Scuderi we will cite at
this point the classicist Dacier, in the seventh chapter of
his Poetics — the Greeks sometimes went so far as to
have twelve or sixteen plays acted in a single day. Among
a people who are fond of spectacles the attention is more
lively than is commonly believed. The Manage de Figaro,
the connecting link of Beau m arch ais's great trilogy, oc-
cupies the whole evening, and who was ever bored or
fatigued by it. Beaumarchais was worthy to venture on
the first step toward that goal of modern art at which
it will be impossible to arrive in two hours, that pro-
found, insatiable interest which results from a vast, life-
like and multiform plot " But," someone will say, "this
performance, consisting of a single play, would be monoto-
nous, would seem terribly long."— Not so. On the con-
trary it vi'ould lose its present monotony and tediousness.
For what is done now? The spectator's entertainment is
divided into two or three sharply defined parts. At first
he is given two hours of serious enjoyment, then one hour
of hilarious enjoyment; these, with the hour of entr' actes,
which we do not include in the enjoyment, make four hours.
What would the romantic drama do ? It would mingle and
blend artistically these two kinds of enjoyment. It would
lead the audience constantly from sobriety to laughter, from
mirthful excitement to heart-breaking emotion, "from grave
to gay, from pleasant to severe." For, as we have already
proved, the drama is the grotesque in conjunction with the
sublime, the sou! within the body; it is tragedy beneath
comedy. Do you not see that, by affording you repose from
: iiii{>ression by means of another, by sharpening the
Ticros BX300
I tnffC Bpm tbe caaac, the merry opoo fbe tenible, and at
seed caliiag in the duras of die open, Aoe p
iriuk prcacnttng bat one plaj, woold be wortb > n
of otfaers? Tbe roraxntic itage would make a |
nroury, diversiScd dHh of that wfaich, oo tbe c
u a dntg divided iota two pilU.
The zaihor ha^ sooct come lo tbe cod of what he bad to
Bajr to tbe reader. He has do idea hoir tbe critics wtd
greet this drama and these thof^bts, summarily set foftb,
stripped of their coroIUn» and ramiScatums, pnt together
cnrrenU calamo, and in baste to bare done with them.
I>oiibtle» they will appear to "tbe disciples of La Harpe"
most impadent and strange. Bui if perdiaoce, naked and
muSeveloped as they are, they should have the power to
start npon the road of truth ^s public whose education is
to far advanced, and whose minds so many notable writings,
of criticism or of original thought, books or new^upers,
have already matured for art, let the public follow that
tmpulston, caring naught whether it comes from a man
onknown, from a voice with no authority, from a work of
little merit. K is a copper bell which summons the people
to the true temple and Otc true God.
There is to-day the old literary regime as well as the
old political regime. The last century still weighs upon
the present one at almost every point. It is notably op-
pressive in the matter of criticism. For instance, you find
living men who repeat to you this definition of taste let fall
by Voltaire: "Taste in poetry is no different from what
it is in women's clothes." Taste, then, is coquetry. Re-
markable words, wbicli depict marvellously Uie painted,
mouchete, powdered poetry of the eighteenth century —
that literature in paniers, pompons and falbalas. They
give an admirable resume of an age with which the loftiest
geniuses could not come in contact without becoming petty,
in one respect or another; of an age when Montesquieu was
able and apt to produce Le Temple de Gnide, Voltaire
Le Temple du Gout, Jean-Jacques Le Devin du Village.
Taste is the common sense of genius. Tliis is what
will soon be demonstrated by another school of criticism,
powerful, outspoken, well-informed, — a school of the cen-
tmy which is beginning to put forth vigorous shoots un-
der the dead and withered branches of the old school.
This youthful criticism, as serious as the other is frivolous,
as learned as the other is ignorant, has already established
organs that are listened to, and one is sometimes sur-
prised to find, even in the least imjiortant sheets, excel-
lent articles emanating from it Joining hands with all
that is fearless and superior in letters, it will deliver us
from two scourges: tottering classicism, and false romanti-
cism, which has the presumption to show itself at the feet
of the true. For modern genius already has its shadow,
its copy, its parasite, its classic, which forms itself upon it,
smears itself with its colours, assumes its livery, picks
up its crumbs, and, like the sorcerer's pupil, puts in play,
with words retained by the memory, elements of theatrical
action of which it has not the secret Thus it does idiotic
things which its master many a time has much difficulty
in making good. But the thing that must be destroyed
first of all is the old false taste. Present-day literature
must be cleansed of its rust. In vain does the rust eat
into it and tarnish it It is addressing a young, stern,
vigorous generation, which does not understand it. The
train of the eighteenth century is still dragging in the
nineteenth ; but we, we young men who have seen Bona-
parte, are not the ones who will carry it.
We are approaching, then, the moment when we shall
see the new criticism prevail, firmly established upon a
broad and deep foundation. People generally will soon
understand that writers should be judged, not according to
rules and species, which are contrary to nature and art,
but according to the immutable principles of the art of
composition, and the special laws of their individual tem-
peraments. The sound judgment of all men will be ashamed
of the criticism which broke Pierre Comeille on the wheel,
gagged Jean Racine, and which ridiculously rphabilitated
John Milton only by virtue of the epic code of Fere le
Bossu. People will consent to place themselves at the
author's standpoint, to view the subject with his eyes, in
order to judge a work intelligently. They will lay aside
—and it is M. de Chateaubriand who speaks — " the paltry
criddsm of defects for the noble and fruitful criticism
of beauties." It is time that all acute minds should grasp
the thread that frequently connects what we, following
I our special whim, call " defects " with what we call " beauty."
Defects — at all events those which we call by that name
—are often the inborn, necessary, inevitable conditions of
good qualities.
Sclt (tenios, eatale comes qui temperat astrum.
Who ever saw a medal without its reverse? a talent that
had not some shadow with its brilliancy, some smoke with
its flame ? Such a blemish can be only the inseparable con-
sequence of such beauty. This rough stroke of the brush,
which offends my eye at close range, completes the effect
and gives relief to the whole picture. Efface one and you
efface the other. Originality is made up of such things.
Genius is necessarily uneven. There are no high moun-
tains without deep ravines. Fill up the valley with tlie
mountain and you will have nothing but a steppe, a plateau,
the plain of Les Sablons instead of the Alps, swallows
and not eagles.
We must also take into account the weather, the climate,
the local influences. The Bible, Homer, hurt us sometimes
by their very sublimities. Who would want to part with
a word of either of them? Our infirmity often takes fright
at the inspired bold flights of genius, for lack of power
to swoop down upon objects with such vast intelligence.
And then, once again, there are defects which take root
only in masterpieces ; it is given only to certain geniuses to
have certain defects. Shakespeare is blamed for his abuse
of metaphysics, of wit, of redundant scenes, of obscenities,
for his employment of the mythological nonsense in vogue
in his time, for exaggeration, obscurity, bad taste, bombast,
asperities of style. The oak, that giant tree which we
were comparing to Shakespeare just now, and which has
more than one point of resemblance to him, the oat has
an unusual shape, gnarled branches, dark leaves, and hard,
rough bark; but it is the oak.
And it is because of these qualities that it ts the oalc.
TO CROMWELL 407
If you would have a smooth trunk, straight branches,
satiny leaves, apply to the pale birch, the hollow elder,
the weeping willow; but leave the mighty oak in peace.
Do not stone that which gives you shade.
The author of this book knows as well as any one the
numerous and gross faults of his works. If it happens
too seldom that he corrects them, it is because it is re-
pugnant to him to return to a work that has grown cold.
Moreover, what has he ever done that is worth that trouble?
The labor that he would throw away in correcting (he im-
perfections of his books, he prefers to use in purging his
intellect of ils defects. It is his method to correct one
work only in another work.
However, no matter what treatment may be accorded
his book, he binds himself not to defend it, in whole or in
part. If his drama is worthless, what is the use of up-
holding it? If it is good, why defend it? Time will do
the book justice or will wreak justice upon it. Its suc-
cess for the moment is the affair of the publisher alone. If
then the wrath of the critics is aroused by the publication
of this essay, he will let them do their worst. What re-
ply should he make to them? He is not one of those who
speak, as the Castiljan poet says, " through the mouths
of their woimds."
Por !a boca de atx herida.
One last word. It may have been noticed that in this
somewhat long journey through so many different subjects,
the author has generally refrained from resting his per-
sonal views upon texts or citations of authorities. It is
not, however, because he did not have them at his hand.
" If the poet establishes things that are impossible ac-
cording to the rules of his art. he makes a mistake un-
questionably; but it ceases to be a mistake when by this
means he has reached the end that he aimed at; for he
has found what he sought." — " They take for nonsense
whatever the weakness of their intellects does not allow them
to understand. They are especially prone to call absurd
those wonderful passages in which the poet, in order the
better to enforce his argument, departs, if we may so ex-
VTCTOR HUGO
' press it, from his argument In fact, the precept which
makes it a rule samettmes to disregard rules, is a mystery
of the art which it is not easy to make men understand who
are absolutely without taste and whom a sort of abnormal-
ity of mind renders insensible to those things which or-
dinarily impress men."
Who said the first? Aristotle. Who said the last?
Boileau. By these two specimens you will see that the au-
thor of this drama might, as well as another, have shielded
himself with proper names and taken refuge behind others'
reputations. But he preferred to leave that style of argu-
ment to those who deem it unanswerahle, universal and all-
powerful. As for himself, he prefers reasons to author-
ities; he has always cared more for arms than for coat$-of-
•rms,
October, 1837.
PREFACE TO LEAVES OF GRASS
BV WALT WHITMAN. (1855)
AMERICA does not repel the past or what it has pro-
Zi duccd under its forms or amid other politics or
-* — *- the idea of castes or the old religions , . . accepts
the lesson with calmness ... is not so impatient as has
been supposed that the slough stil! sticks to opinions and
manners and literature while the life which served its re-
quirements has passed into the new life of the new forms
. . . perceives that the corpse is slowly borne from the eat-
ing and sleeping rooms of the house . . - perceives that it
waits a little while in the door . . . that it was fittest for its
days . . . that its action has descended to the stalwart and
well shaped heir who approaches . , . and that he shall be
fittest for his days.
The Americans of all nations at any time upon the earth,
have probably the fullest poetical nature. The United
States themselves are essentially the greatest poem. In
the history of the earth hitherto the largest and most stir-
ring appear tame and orderly to their ampler largeness and
stir. Here at last is something in the doings of man that
corresponds with the broadcast doings of the day and night.
Here is not merely a nation but a teeming nation of nations.
Here is action untied from strings necessarily blind to
particulars and details magnificently moving in vast masses.
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410
WALT WHITMAN
Here is the hospitality which forever indicates heroes.
. . . Here are the roughs and beards and space and rug-
gedness and nonchalance that the soul loves. Here the
performance disdaining the trivial unapproached in the tre-
mendous audacity of its crowds and groupings and the push
of its perspective spreads with crampless and flowing breadth
and showers its profl